


Safe with you

by Schist



Category: Batman (Movies - Nolan), Batman Begins (2005)
Genre: 19th Century, Alternate Universe - Historical, Arkham Asylum, Arranged Marriage, Bondage, F/M, Mental Illness, Plotty
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-14
Updated: 2015-08-27
Packaged: 2018-04-14 17:16:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 16
Words: 32,208
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4572936
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Schist/pseuds/Schist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gotham City in the early 19th century: Selina has neither money nor connections and knows she can't be picky when it comes to marriage. She's thrilled when the handsome Dr Crane asks for her hand, but she has no idea what she's getting herself into.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

His card arrived at breakfast.

It was nothing out of the ordinary – a nice card with a polite request to call on us after lunch – but my parents reacted as if the King himself was coming to visit.

“I told you!” mother said to father. “It was the right decision to introduce her in the city.”

My aunt nodded proudly. It had been her idea, and we were staying at her house. Father smiled and nodded. He looked happy now but I remembered how he had complained about the costs. It made me uncomfortable to see their excitement. If this – staying in Gotham City and going to parties with Important People – didn’t result in a wedding it would be a devastating waste of money.

“Dr Jonathan Crane” father said and studied the card.

He gave it to mother, who read it carefully.

“Who was he?” she asked.

“The psychiatrist, wasn’t it?” father said. “Works in the asylum out on that island… I forget the name.”

“Yes, I remember him. He seemed like a nice young man. Perhaps a little cold.”

She gave the card to me. He had neat handwriting. I looked at the name and tried to remember who he was. A picture of a young man with dark hair, a beautiful face and reserved manners came to me, but I wasn’t entirely certain it was him. There had been so many young men at the party last night. Don’t get your hopes up, I told myself. But of course I did get my hopes up.

As did my parents. They hoped for more cards, and waited eagerly all through the morning, but none came. It was disappointing but not surprising, I was after all the daughter of a country doctor and didn’t have much to compete with. I looked at Dr Crane’s card again. Would this man become my husband?

“Selena Crane” I whispered to myself to see if it suited me.

I had played that game many times as a girl, but now it wasn’t a game anymore.

 

Nervous ruckus broke out in the house when there was finally a knock on the door. I had barely managed to eat anything for lunch and my mother had spent quite some time making me beautiful so I barely dared move for fear of messing up my hair or disarranging my clothing.

“Sit here!” mother said and all but shoved me on to the drawing room sofa. “No, not like that, you look like a sack of potatoes! Mind your posture! Look dignified!”

I straightened my back. I could hear voices downstairs and my stomach filled with anxious butterflies.

“No, not that much. You look too proud. Look friendly.”

I tried to smile, but felt too scared and nauseous to do a very good job of it. My mother sighed, looking exasperated. She was just about to give me more instructions when there was a knock on the door and the maid came in.

“Dr Jonathan Crane” she announced and let the gentleman in.

He stepped inside and my breath caught in my throat when I saw him. It was the man with the dark hair and the pretty face just as I had thought, but he was far more beautiful than I remembered. He bowed stiffly at my mother and then at me. He was tall and thin and well dressed in black trousers and jacket and a light blue cravat almost the same color as his eyes. He took my breath away. To be honest it was a little like seeing an unusually beautiful horse at market. That perfect specimen you really want but know you could never afford.

“It’s so nice to meet you, Dr Crane” mother said. “Will you please sit down? Lucy, bring the tea.”

“Yes ma’am” Lucy said and left.

Dr Crane sat down in the armchair next to the sofa. Mother sat down next to me on the sofa. We looked awkwardly at each other.

“Did you have a good time at the party yesterday?” Crane asked finally.

He sounded cool, distant, as if he only asked to be polite.

“Yes” I said. “I did. Did you?”

“I’m not that interested in parties” he said. “I care mostly about my work.”

“Tell me about it” I said, and saw mother flinch out of the corner of my eye at such a direct question.

Crane looked at me as if to he wondered about my intentions.

“If you don’t mind” I added. “I hear you’re a psychiatrist?”

“Yes” he said, a little friendlier now. “I run the Arkham asylum.”

“How exciting” I said.

He almost smiled.

“It is” he said. “It’s fascinating to study the human mind. There are so many things that can go wrong, the mind is almost like a labyrinth.”

I nodded. Lucy came in with the tea and offered a welcome distraction. I glanced at Dr Crane when he was busy with his tea. Something stirred inside me. Was this what love felt like? Was it even possible to fall in love with someone you had just met? It happened in books, but I had always been skeptical. He was so beautiful he made my heart ache, and there was something about him, something sad in his eyes. I found myself hoping he would ask for my hand.

“Your father is a doctor too I hear?” he said after a while.

I looked at his slim white hand holding the tea cup.

“Yes” I said. “He’s only a country doctor, but he means a lot to the people in his district. I’ve helped him many times, both in his practice and on house calls.”

“Have you?” Crane said and I thought I saw genuine interest in his face for the first time. “Do you have training as a nurse?”

“No schooling, but I have plenty of practical training from helping my father. My mother disapproves, she doesn’t think it suits a lady, but I need to do something. I could never sit and embroider all day long.”

Mother gave me a stern look, but Crane smiled and a hint of warmth reached his eyes. I looked into them and felt like I was falling. They were the strangest shade of blue I had ever seen. Almost turquoise.

“I understand perfectly” he said. “I don’t know what I would do without my work.”

We chatted for a few more minutes, and then he excused himself. But before he left he asked us if he could have the honor of calling on us again tomorrow. When he had left mother and I looked at each other. I felt elated, but mother looked troubled.

“I don’t like him” she said.

“Why not?”

“There’s something about him… he’s too cold, too distant. He will not make a good husband.”

“I’m sure he’s just shy. I like him. He has passion, he just hides it. Like I do.”

“If he asks for your hand, do you want me to accept?” she asked.

“Yes.”

She looked at me for a long moment. I started to feel insecure. I had expected her to jump at any chance of marrying me away, so why was she so reluctant? I thought about Dr Crane. Could she be right?

“Very well” she said. “Let’s see what he says tomorrow.”

 

The next day was even more anxious as we waited for Dr Crane’s arrival. I wrote a letter to my best friend Talia at home, just to get all my confused thoughts and feelings on paper and perhaps create a little order in the chaos that was my heart and mind. When he finally arrived it was a repetition of the previous day at first. Tea and small talk. Then he asked if he could have a word with me alone. The butterflies in my stomach seemed to explode. Mother agreed, gave me a strange look and then left the room.

Silence filled the space between us. Dr Crane looked at me, and I looked back. My heart was pounding. He swallowed, licked his lips.

“Would you marry me?” he said finally.

His face and voice were grave and controlled, but I smiled big and wide.

“I will” I said.

A small smile flickered across his face.

“I’m glad” he said, took my hand and kissed it. “You make me very happy.”

A small part of me didn’t think he looked very happy, but I was sure he would be. Selecting a wife must be serious business for a man. He would have to make do with me for the rest of his life, and didn’t know for sure how I would contribute to his reputation and his daily life.

“I am very happy too” I said, and meant it.

“I will have to speak to your parents” he said and got up. “If you will excuse me.”

“Of course.”

I waited impatiently while he went downstairs to find them. I knew they would say yes, but I was still nervous. Finally mother came into the drawing room. She was smiling.

“Congratulations” she said and took my hands. “I hope you will be very happy.”

I looked past her at the empty doorway.

“Where is he?” I asked.

“He left. But he promised to call again sometime this week.”

I felt a stab of disappointment. I had hoped to talk to him some more. But there would be plenty of chances to talk to him, after all we would soon be married. Selena Crane, I thought. It suits me.


	2. Chapter 2

The wedding was held in a small church in the city. I spent all morning being made pretty, my hair done up with flowers, and barely dared move when I was finally ready.

“How do you feel?” father asked when he came to get me.

I tried to smile.

“Good I think. I don’t know.”

“Have you eaten anything? We don’t want you to faint at the altar.”

I looked at him in horror, and he laughed.

“You won’t” he said. “But have a sip of this just in case.”

He poured me half a glass of wine, and I drank it carefully. I had eaten, but not much, and the wine felt refreshing.

My family and some of our friends were waiting in the church for us, including Talia and her mother. It felt good to see them when I walked down the aisle with father at my side. Crane’s side of the church was empty, and I looked at father in alarm. Was something wrong? Didn’t he have _any_ family? No friends? Father only shrugged slightly, and I looked at Crane instead. He was standing by the altar waiting for me, dressed beautifully in a black tailored jacket that fit him perfectly. His best man was standing next to him, a large man I had only been introduced to and never really talked to. His name was Bane and he worked with Dr Crane at Arkham. He was almost as well dressed as Crane, but despite that he looked like a thug, or maybe a boxer.

 

The reception after the ceremony was held at my aunt’s house and the food, drink and decorations were nicer than anything we’d ever had before. Flowers everywhere. I wondered who was paying for it all, but then forced myself to stop thinking about it. I would only get married once in my life and this beautiful party and the money spent on it would be meaningless if I didn’t enjoy it.

“Mrs Crane” mother said and smiled. “How does it feel?”

Her cheeks were flushed with wine. She looked happy.

“Good, I think” I said. “It’s so overwhelming.”

She nodded and the happy look on her face disappeared.

“Marriage isn’t easy” she said. “No matter who you marry.”

She glanced at Dr Crane who was standing on the other side of the table chatting to one of my cousins.

 

When the reception was over he took me home. He was quiet in the carriage, looked lost in thought, tired even. I wondered if he felt as overwhelmed and confused as I did. He was older than I was but getting married must still be a big change for him. I could ask him, but I didn’t know if he would want me to. Should I perhaps take his hand? The thought of touching made me think about what awaited us now. The wedding night. I felt excited and frightened at the same time. I looked at him, wondered what he looked like without his clothes, but couldn’t picture it. I had never seen a naked man before, except statues and paintings. He had such a beautiful face, symmetric with high cheekbones, full lips and those incredible blue eyes that were such a striking contrast to his black hair. My heart swelled with love and pride.

“Are you happy?” I asked.

He looked at me and seemed surprised.

“Happy?” he said. “I guess so.”

He was quiet for a while, then he looked at me again. I wondered what he felt when he saw me. Did he love me? Did he find me attractive?

“Are you?” he asked.

“Yes” I said.

It wasn’t exactly a lie, but not exactly true either. I took his hand. He pulled it away, so I let go.

“Sorry” I said.

He looked out the window and stayed like that until we reached his house.

 

He had a small two story house on the other side of town, near Arkham Island where he worked. He had told me that he rarely entertained guests at home and sometimes even slept in his office at the asylum when he was working late. I found it strange that he could even consider living in an office.

The house was nice but sparsely furnished and with few decorations. A bachelor’s home. No, I corrected myself. It was _our_ home now. I would be expected to put my woman’s touch to it and make it fit for society. He (we) had a butler who received us when we came in.

“I will get you a maid” Jonathan promised as the servant helped with my coat. “I’m working on it.”

“It’s fine” I said and smiled. “You will have to help me with my dresses until then.”

He gave me a strange look.

We were served tea in the drawing room.

“Anything else, doctor?” the butler asked.

“No, you may go.”

He bowed to us both and then he left. Jonathan and I sat in awkward silence with our tea cups. It was the first time we were unsupervised and I was nervous. We made small talk and drank our tea.

“Shall we go to bed?” Jonathan asked finally.

I smiled nervously.

“Yes” I said.

It was late and I should be tired, but I was buzzing with nervous anticipation. The bedroom looked simple even compared to the rest of the house.

“I had a new bed put in” he said. “A bigger one. And a closet for you.”

There were two closets and one of them looked new.

“Thank you” I said.

Apart from the bed and the closets there were two bedside tables and a full length mirror. That was all. No ornaments or paintings, only a carpet on the floor.

I turned towards him and he kissed me. It took me by surprise, but when he kissed me again I was ready. I tried to imitate what he was doing with his lips and tongue. It was gross and wonderful at the same time and I felt lust start to stir in me.

“Turn around” he said.

I did, and felt his fingers work the lacing in my dress. It took a while but finally he pulled my dress down and let it fall to the floor. I turned back to him, unsure of what to do now. I stood there in only my shift and felt so naked I had to put my arms around myself. This wasn’t how I had imagined it.

“Don’t” he said and pulled my arms away.

His voice was hard, as was his touch, and I started to feel scared. He started to take my shift off and I wanted to stop him but forced myself to do nothing. It’s going too fast, I thought. I don’t want this. He peeled my shift off, threw it on the floor and stared hungrily at my naked breasts.

“Take your stockings off” he said.

I did, with shaking hands, and then stood before him completely naked. I had thought he would look lovingly at me and perhaps say romantic things, but his eyes were cold and his face hard. I wanted to cry and go and hide or put my clothes back on. He put his hands on me, caressed me all over and I tried to relax and enjoy it. He’s my husband, I reminded myself. I have to trust him. But it only felt invasive. He came closer, kissed me and then whispered in my ear:

“I’m going to rape you.”

I gasped and he smiled. He was breathing fast as if he had been running and his cheeks were flushed and eyes glowing. I wanted to ask him why he would say such a thing, but my breath caught in my throat.

Suddenly he grabbed me by the waist and dragged me over to the bed. He threw me onto it and then quickly undressed himself. I watched, not knowing what else to do. When he took his underpants off I stared in horror at his crotch. I’d had a vague idea of what to expect but to see it in real life was shocking. Was that supposed to go inside me? I started to cry. He came up onto the bed and leaned over me supported by his hands. He looked me in the eyes and seemed to like what he saw because he smiled. He shifted his weight to one hand and used the other to touch himself. I didn’t want to watch but I couldn’t turn my eyes away.

“Dr Crane” I whimpered when I finally found my voice. “Please.”

He didn’t seem to hear me. He let go of himself and started to touch my breasts instead. I whimpered and cried, hoping he would stop.

He pushed inside me. I screamed.

“Shut up or I’ll kill you” he grunted and started to move inside me.

It hurt, a sharp burning pain, but I clamped my mouth shut to keep the screams inside my head. I breathed in quick shallow snorts through my nose. Jonathan kept staring at me, his eyes locked on mine. I closed my eyes.

“Open your eyes!” he barked.

I did. I stared at him in horror while he kept moving inside me and his face changed. He moaned and grunted and then it was over. He pulled out of me and left the room. I lay where I was, too scared to move. I wondered if I was bleeding. I wanted to cover myself but didn’t know if he would let me.

He came back after only a few minutes wearing a nightshirt. He handed me a wet washcloth.

“Wash yourself off” he said and now his voice was soft and kind. “Do you want me to do it?”

I shook my head and carefully dabbed at my aching privates. The washcloth came away a little red, not as much as I had thought.

“I’m sorry about that” Jonathan said and took the washcloth again. “It will get better.”

He lay down in bed next to me. I pulled my nightgown on with shaking hands and then lay down again. He seemed to fall asleep after a while but I lay awake for hours. I wondered if this was what the marriage bed was like for everyone. For my mother? How often would I have to do this? I cried quietly and wished I was at home with my parents.

 

 


	3. Chapter 3

I did manage to sleep at last, but when I woke up it was with a feeling of dread. My privates hurt with a dull burning ache and my head hurt from all the crying and the lack of sleep. This was my first day of being married and I had no idea what to expect. I had thought I knew but last night had left me in a complete void. I looked at Jonathan, who was sleeping next to me. He looked boyishly beautiful, a strangely innocent look. I wanted to like him, I felt like I should like my husband, but the sight of him made me nauseous.

I lay there not knowing what to do. The house didn’t feel like my home, I felt like I couldn’t get up and wander around on my own without his consent. I needed to pee but dreaded the pain. Finally he woke up. He looked at me and seemed surprised to see me.

“Good morning” he said.

“Good morning.”

He sat up, stuck his feet in his slippers and got up and put on a dressing robe. He turned to me just as I tried to get up, wincing from the pain.

He looked at me and then left the room but came back almost instantly with a small brown glass jar. He pressed it into my hand.

“In case there’s pain” he said.

“Thank you.”

He helped me up. I jerked when he touched me but it didn’t seem to bother him and I forced myself to not pull away. He helped me put my dressing gown on before escorting me to the privy. It was a relief to be alone when I shut the door. I felt just as confused by Jonathan’s kindness now as by his cruelty last night. Or rather the combination. He obviously understood that he had hurt me, which made what he had done even more terrible. It felt like such a betrayal. He hadn’t needed to force himself on me, I would have had him gladly. But he hadn’t even tried.

It made my headache worse to think about it so I tried to focus on the matter on hand. I relieved myself in excruciating pain and then used the ointment Jonathan had given me. He was right; it helped right away. I looked at the label: “Antiseptic cream for treatment of wounds and pain relief. Arkham asylum.” The name of Jonathan’s workplace increased my feeling of fear and dread. Growing up in the country like I had I hadn’t heard much about Arkham, except that was where all the worst criminals went. The jar in my hand made it seem much closer. I put it on a shelf so I could use it again later, and then went to the dining room for breakfast.

 

After breakfast Jonathan got ready for work. Before we were married I had pictured myself helping him with work, listening to his stories about his patients, advising him on how to help the criminally insane repent their sins and become better people. I had even seen myself working at the asylum, bringing comfort and care to the inmates. Now I was just glad he was leaving so I could have some time alone to think and be free of him at least until tonight.

“Do you need any help with your clothing?” he asked when he was dressed and ready. “Robert is interviewing a maid this afternoon. You’re welcome to sit in.”

“Thank you, I’ll be fine. Perhaps the housekeeper can help if necessary.”

He looked relieved.

“I’ll see you for dinner” he said.

“Yes. Have a good day.”

He left. I went to the bedroom and dressed myself, choosing a gown that I could put on by myself and made a simple braid of my hair. Then I sat down in the drawing room and wondered what to do with myself. I felt lost and scared and sad. I didn’t want to be in this empty house, it wasn’t my home and I didn’t want my husband to come home and rape me again. I thought about what mother had said at my wedding reception. You can always come to us. Was this what she meant? Had she known? No, she couldn’t have. She would never have let me marry him if she had known what he would do.

I played with the thought of taking a carriage and going home. My parents had already returned to the country, but as Mrs Crane I could probably rent a carriage or buy a train ticket on Jonathan’s expense. But then what? I was married, I would still have to come back here. I cried for a while and despaired at the hopelessness of my situation.

Robert, the butler, served tea and then lunch. I tried to read but my mind wandered. I tried to think that perhaps Jonathan hadn’t intended to hurt me, but I remembered clearly how he had looked me straight in the eyes and told me he was going to rape me. No matter how hard I thought I couldn’t make any sense of any of it.

It was a strange day. I wasn’t used to being alone all day. I saw the new maid when she came for her interview, but except for that I was all by myself. I lay down to rest after lunch, and when I woke up I felt restless. I looked through Jonathan’s library but most of his books were medical texts. I wondered if he would let me buy some novels.  

When Jonathan came home I was tired despite having done so little. Seeing him made my stomach hurt.

“How was your day?” he asked a little stiffly when we sat down to dinner.

“We need more books” I blurted out.

He smiled.

“Whatever you want. I imagine my library must bore you.”

“Well, I would like to read some of the medical books, but I fear I lack the training to understand them.”

He didn’t say anything for a while and I was afraid I had made him angry.

“Why don’t you choose a book that interests you” he said finally. “And we can read it together.”

He looked at me.

“If you care to” he added in a cool tone.

“I do” I said.

Medicine had always interested me.

“Very well” he said. “And you may go to the book store and order some novels or poetry or whatever you like.”

“Thank you.”

We ate in silence for a moment. It felt surreal that we were married and would spend the rest of our lives together. I couldn’t imagine us ever being any other way than this: awkward and distant.

“How was your day?” I asked.

“It was good. I had quite a breakthrough with a delusional patient. I think I know now what happened to make him ill.”

“That’s nice. Can you help with his delusions?”

“I think so. I’m going to use a special kind of therapy to bring him back to what happened and deal with it. It can be very effective.”

I was terrified when we went to bed that night. I put my nightgown on with shaking hands and went to bed even though I’d rather be anywhere but there. He didn’t look at me, only lay down next to me, said goodnight and put the light out. It wasn’t until he started to snore that I could finally relax.


	4. Chapter 4

The next day was a little better. Jonathan hadn’t touched me during the night and I felt a little more comfortable when we shared breakfast in the morning. We talked about normal things like the weather and what we would like for dinner and how the new maid seemed. When he left the maid helped me with my clothes and my hair. Being properly dressed made me feel more like myself.

I took the maid and went out to the shops before lunch. It was nice to be outside and to walk around town like a married woman. It felt like everyone looked at me differently now and treated me with more respect. I had written a list of my favorite books that I wanted to order and spent some time in the book shop looking at books I hadn’t read yet. When I finally placed my order and asked them to bill Dr Crane I felt a little nervous. Had I spent too much money?

We went by the outdoors market on our way home and bought meat for dinner. When we arrived back home lunch was on the table and when I sat down Roberts, the butler, handed me a card.

_Dear Mrs Crane. We met at the party at the Waynes a few weeks ago. I would love to make your closer acquaintance if you would do me the honor of having tea with me on Thursday this week at 3 pm. Yours, Rachel Dent._

I read the card several times, too excited to put it down and begin my meal. I remembered Mrs Dent and her husband from the party where I had met Jonathan. Mr Dent knew Jonathan in some way or other. He and his wife had both seemed lovely but I hadn’t spent too much time chatting with them since I had been on the lookout for unmarried men.

“Roberts” I said. “Please fetch me a card and pen.”

He did, and I wrote a short reply that I would be delighted to join her on Thursday, and then asked Roberts to send it right away.

 

That night I woke up from a strange sound. It was almost morning, the darkness outside was starting to give way to the first hint of dawn. Jonathan was moving next to me and said something I couldn’t make out. At first I was terrified he was going to rape me again. He hadn’t touched me in two nights and I was starting to hope that he had seen the error of his ways but why else would he talk to me in the middle of the night? Then I realized he wasn’t talking to me. I could see his face in the faint light from the window. He was asleep but looked troubled, even scared.

“No, don’t” he mumbled. “Please stop.”

He sounded like he was on the verge of tears. I didn’t know what to do. Nothing had prepared me for this. Men were strong and took care of you, they did not have nightmares and cry in their sleep. 

“Jonathan, dear” I said and carefully shook his shoulder. “You’re having a nightmare.”

I had to try several times before he finally opened his eyes. He stared at me in horror as if he didn’t recognize me.

“It’s just me” I said and tried to make my voice soft even though I felt so shaken. “Your wife.”

His relaxed a little.

“What did you dream?” I asked.

“Nothing.”

He looked away. And uncomfortable silence filled the room.  

“Are you all right? Can I help?” I asked. “I could wake Roberts and get you a cup of tea?”

He shook his head.

“Just go back to sleep” he said, but his voice was soft. “It was just a dream.”

“As you wish.”

I lay down again but couldn’t go back to sleep. I could hear from his breathing that he was still awake too. I looked at him. He was lying with his eyes open and he looked sad. I hesitated but then reached out my hand and gently caressed his hair. He looked at me in surprise but didn’t say anything so I did it again. He gave me a small smile and then he closed his eyes. I continued for a little while until my hand got tired. I didn’t think he was asleep, but he seemed calmer. I lay awake for a while longer thinking about how strange men were.

The next morning he didn’t mention the nightmare, and neither did I. We had breakfast and talked about casual things, and then he left. But the next night he raped me again. It hurt less this time.

 

I was nervous and excited about visiting Mrs Dent. I had my maid dress me up and do my hair and then changed my mind and chose a different outfit several times until the maid smiled and said:

“You look lovely, Mrs Crane. If you wear a yellow or a green dress makes little difference.”

I looked at her, surprised that she spoke without first being spoken to. She looked a little worried.

“Perhaps you’re right” I said and sighed. “I don’t know how to look like a doctor’s wife! Should I look informal? Elegant? What kind of impression should I make?”

“I don’t know, ma’am” the maid said.

“Of course you don’t” I muttered and hesitated for a while longer before finally settling on the green one.

The Dents had a house not unlike our own and only a few blocks away. I dismissed Roberts’ offers of getting me a carriage and decided to walk. I didn’t even bring the maid.

The Dents’ maid let me in and took me to a lovely drawing room where Mrs Dent was waiting. She rose when she saw me.

“Mrs Crane, how lovely of you to come and relieve my boredom. I was so happy to hear that you live so close!”

“Thank you for the invitation” I said and kissed her cheeks. “I didn’t know what to do with myself alone all day in that empty house.”

“I know” Rachel said and smiled. “In a way I think I was happier before I got married. At least then I had my sisters.”

We sat down to tea and chatted about the Wayne party, gossiped about people we had met there and discussed the weather at length.

“So how do you like married life?” she asked when it was almost time to leave.

“I’m very happy” I said and tried to look like I meant it.

She looked at me with a serious expression.

“It’s not that easy, is it?” she said. “I remember when we were just married. He was good to me but there were things I wasn’t quite prepared for.”

I wondered if she meant things in bed, and my body went rigid with attention.

“I agree” I said cautiously.

“Is he nice to you? Dr Crane always seems so serious. Hardly the romantic.”

She smiled.

“Mostly he is” I said. “Though sometimes he is… rough.”

We looked at each other and I almost held my breath hoping she would understand. She sighed.

“I’ve found that I can… wield a certain power in certain situations” she said slowly. “There are things a man wants and needs from his wife and different ways of going about getting it.”

I nodded, hoping she would go on.

“If one finds out what he needs most” she said. “One can sometimes use that to one’s advantage.”

I nodded. I didn’t understand but was afraid to ask. She had already said too much and we would both have to go to church on Sunday and repent our dirty mouths. To speak about these things were bad enough, but to insinuate that we might not respect and obey our husbands in every way was blasphemy. Rachel smiled.

“You will find your own ways” she said and stood up to show that our time was up. “I am so happy you could come and I hope that we can see each other again soon.”

“Would you like to come to tea next week?” I asked and stood up too.

“I would love to!”

“Lovely. I’ll see you soon.”


	5. Chapter 5

The next few weeks passed in some kind of harmony. I saw Rachel and some of her friends, we went to church on Sundays (Jonathan wouldn’t go so Rachel took me). Some nights he forced himself on me again, and it hurt less each time. I came to expect it.

I figured out I could close my eyes and pretend that I was somewhere else.

“Open your eyes” he grunted.

“No.”

He slapped me in the face and I opened my eyes and stared at him in horror.

“Why do you do this?” I asked.

I didn’t care just then if he hit me again or did something else, he was already treating me so bad I couldn’t imagine anything worse.

He leaned closer.

“I want you to be afraid” he growled.

Why would he want me to be afraid? I was his wife, we should trust and love each other. It frightened and hurt me but it also made me angry. There was no need for this! I had thought a lot about what Rachel had said about having power if you knew what he needed, but it made very little sense to me. Perhaps she had been talking about something else. Thinking about it made me feel stupid and helpless. Maybe I should just accept how things were and try to be a good wife. But this got me thinking again. If he wanted me to be afraid, could I use it to my advantage? Fake fear?

“But I’m not” I said. It wasn’t entirely true, but I didn’t feel anywhere near the terror I’d felt the first time. “You are already hurting me so much, there’s nothing else to fear.”

He looked angry and then he put his hand on my throat, hard so I couldn’t breathe. Terror flooded me and I tried to pull his hand away but he was too strong. I’m going to die, I thought. My husband is going to kill me.

I didn’t know how much time passed as I struggled to breathe and felt him move inside me. My throat hurt, it felt like he was crushing it with his hand.

I gave up. If this was what he wanted there was nothing I could do. I stopped fighting, closed my eyes and tried to make peace with God in case I actually did die here and now.  

Jonathan stopped moving inside me. He took his hand away.

“Selina?” he asked.

He gently touched my face, shook my shoulder. I could feel my body take long and ragged breaths but I was tired and sluggish from the lack of air and kept my eyes closed. I didn’t know if I was still dying but it didn’t seem to matter. Everything seemed so far away and unimportant.

“Selina I’m sorry” he said and it was strangely satisfying to hear fear in his voice. “Selina wake up, please. I’m so sorry.”

Suddenly Rachel’s words meant something. Power. At this very moment I had power over him. He had tried to force me and he had failed.

“Selina please…” he said and shook my shoulder and fingered my throat as if he could fix it with his hands. I could hear he was crying and it made me feel good. He deserved it.

I coughed and slowly opened my eyes. It was even more rewarding to see the look of relief on his face.

“Selina!” he said. “You’re all right. Please say you’re all right.”

“I don’t know” I whispered. “Why did you do that?”

“I don’t know” he sobbed and put his arms around me. “I’m so sorry. Please forgive me.”

He cried with his face against my chest. I wanted to push him away, preferably push him off the bed. It would be so satisfying to hear him fall to the floor, but instead I lay still until he started to calm down.

“You’re never going to do that again” I said in a hoarse voice through my still aching throat.

I could barely hold back the anger that was surging through me.

“I promise.”

“You will never hurt me again. You will never touch me without my consent and you will never scare me again.”

“I promise” he whined and cried harder again.

“Then I forgive you.”

He looked up at me, streaming tears and red eyes making his beautiful face look puffy and distorted. He looked grateful and relieved. Who was this strange creature? In only a few weeks I had seen more different sides to him than to any other person I had ever known.

“Thank you” he said and laid down again.

He fell asleep like that, curled up next to me with his head on my shoulder. His hair was soft and smelled nice. I lay awake thinking about power. He had wanted to scare me but then I had scared him more. I won.

 

“I would so like to see where you work” I said one evening as we were having tea in the library.

We had been reading from one of his textbooks. I read out loud and whenever I came to a word or concept I didn’t understand I stopped and let him explain. The fields of psychology and psychiatry were even more interesting than I had thought, but also frightening. There were so many things that could go wrong in a human mind, and the outcomes could be so terrible. Some of the things we read about made me think about Jonathan and his behavior in bed, but I never brought it up. He hadn’t made any move to touch me since that night when he had almost strangled me. I’d had to stay at home and pretend illness for a week until the bruise on my throat healed, and he had looked like a beaten child the whole time.

“I will take you to Arkham if you want” he said. “But I have to warn you. If these books frighten you, you might not want to see my patients. It’s so much more frightening in real life.”

“I understand. I would still like to see it.”

“You realize my patients are criminals? Murderers and rapists?”

I wondered how he could say that with a gleam in his eyes as if that was something extraordinary. Had he forgotten he was a rapist too?

“Would I be in any danger?” I asked.

He laughed.

“Of course not. They are all locked in their cells and only allowed to the therapy rooms if they are restrained or heavily sedated. We go through a lot of straitjackets.”

He looked at me and smiled.

“You can come tomorrow, if you don’t have other plans? Perhaps you could be of use. We are very understaffed.”

I knew they were, he often came home late and complained about being overworked. For a while I had used that as an excuse to explain his sometimes violent behavior.

“I have no engagements tomorrow” I said.

“Good. Then prepare to visit the criminally insane.”

He grinned as if that pleased him. I smiled back.

That night he had another nightmare. He had them often, several times a week. I only had nightmares very rarely, so it surprised me that they plagued him so. Sometimes they seemed less severe and I didn’t always wake him up. This one was bad though, he was crying and tossing around. I was just about to wake him up when he suddenly screamed. I gasped and felt my blood go cold. I had never heard a scream like that before.

“Jonathan!” I yelled and shook him as hard as I could. “Wake up!”

He woke up with a start, sat up in bed and looked around as if he expected someone to attack him. Then he looked at me, wild-eyed, panting and with his hair on end. It made my heart ache.

“You were having a nightmare” I said and tried to sound soothing even though my heart was pounding.

He nodded and slowly caught his breath.

“You were screaming” I said.

“Was I? I’m sorry I woke you.”

“I don’t mind. I just wish I could help.”

“You are helping” he said. “It’s a relief to have someone to wake me up. I always used to sleep alone.”

My heart almost broke with the implication of that. To be alone, trapped in those terrible dreams, without anyone to wake him up or comfort him afterwards.

“Come here” I said, lay down again and opened my arms to him. “Let me hold you.”

“Thank you.”

He put his head on my shoulder and I hugged him and stroked his hair. I felt closer to him than I ever had before.

“I wish you would tell me what you dream about” I said.

“No you don’t” he mumbled. “You would have nightmares too. Perhaps I should not bring you to Arkham. I don’t want to risk ruining your sweet innocence.”

“Let me decide what to do with my sweet innocence” I said.

He turned his head a little so he could look at me. Then he nodded.

“Perhaps you’re stronger than I thought” he said softly.


	6. Chapter 6

Arkham Island was in the Gotham River, on the outskirts of the city. A guard stopped us when we reached the bridge. He came up to the carriage window and gave us a stern look but when he saw Jonathan his face softened.

“Good morning Dr Crane” he said, bowed slightly and gestured at the driver to keep going.

“What was that?” I asked as we were set in motion again.

“We have to have very strict security” Jonathan said. “The bridge is the only way on and off the island unless you feel like swimming.”

I looked down at the river we were crossing. It was wide and wild, close to the Gotham Bay and looked more like ocean than river. I didn’t feel like swimming.

The island itself was beautiful. It was fairly small and green with the Arkham Asylum at its center. The asylum looked impressive; a cluster of large gothic buildings with towers and arches. The rest of the island consisted mostly of meadow and patches of forest, with the occasional house here and there.

“I own a piece of land here” Jonathan said. “I’m hoping to build a house one day. It would be so much easier if I could live on the island and not have to travel from the city every day.”

“I thought it would be more populated” I said and looked over the empty spaces around the asylum. “Why don’t more people build here, it’s beautiful.”

“Nobody wants to” Jonathan said and sounded disgusted. “Everyone is afraid to live near the asylum. The land is cheap but the city doesn’t want to grant building permits. They say a house here will be impossible to sell because of the asylum. The cottages you see here were built before Arkham became what it is. Only some of the staff live here now.”

I looked at the asylum as we approached it. It was fenced in by a tall cast-iron fence with sharp spikes at the top. It looked intimidating. Two guards stopped us outside the gate, but when they saw it was Jonathan they let us through.

Even though the buildings were impressive and beautiful, with well-kept gardens and walkways between them, it was obvious when we stepped out of the carriage that this was no ordinary mansion. There was something pressing about the atmosphere here. Jonathan didn’t seem to feel it, or perhaps he was just used to it. He smiled and took my hand to help me out, but I felt uncomfortable and wondered if it had really been a good idea to come here. The people locked up in here might be poor souls in need of help, but they were also some of the worst criminals of the country. I reminded myself of what Jonathan had told me; that no inmate was let out of his cell without either restraints or strong medication. It did little to help my discomfort.

We went inside the main building. I had never been to a place that was designed to be purely practical. There were no decorations, no carpets, flowers, paintings or any other arrangements to make the inside of the house more agreeable. Only bare corridors and empty walls. They didn’t even have wallpaper; all the walls were painted a dark yellow that was probably meant to feel warm but just looked dirty. The barred windows were narrow and the walls were thick so not much light was let in. Despite the morning sunshine outside it felt like dusk in here. And there was a strange smell in the air, something animal but not quite, under a thin cover of soap and medical alcohol. It reminded me again what this place was for, and I pressed closer to Jonathan. He smiled and took my arm in a firm grip. It felt reassuring.

“Are you scared?” he asked.

I felt a stab of fear when I remembered how he had asked me that in bed, but I managed to hide it.

“A little” I confessed.

We went to his office, Jonathan unlocking several gates to get there. His office was nicer than the rest of the building, with a beautiful desk and several bookshelves crammed full of books. It had curtains and a carpet but no wallpaper or paintings, and the strange smell was in there too. He lit a gas lamp that spread a soft yellow glow through the room, and I noticed that the narrow window was barred. It gave me a spell of claustrophobia, and I suddenly wished I could leave right away. If I asked to be sent home he would understand, I was sure of it, but he would never take me here again. I struggled to breathe slowly and keep my composure, but he must have noticed because he came up to me and put his arms around me.

“Don’t worry, you’re perfectly safe here” he said softly.

“Why are there bars on the window in your office?”

“Because I sometimes see patients in here. It’s just a safety measure.”

“I see.”

He held me a moment longer and I felt something hard press against my stomach. I didn’t know what it was at first, but then I realized. My first reaction was horror. How could he feel excited here? How could anything in this place create feelings like that? Then I felt disgust and shame, and let go of him. I glanced at the bulge in his pants and felt like I wanted to throw up. He didn’t seem to notice. He looked happy and cheerful.

“Let me show you some of my work” he said and went to his desk.

He had a walk-in closet where he kept his files. He showed me folders with lists of patients, what they had done to end up in Arkham, what kinds of treatments they were receiving and what medication they were on. It was all very neat and organized. He had notes on how they were progressing, but I understood little of it. It was mostly names of drugs and therapies I didn’t know anything about.

“Let me show you the medicine storage and the lab” he said. “I’m very proud of it. We have the best selection of psychofarmaceuticals in the country. Top of the line. We produce most of them here and I have developed many of them myself.”

I still felt rattled but couldn’t help being smitten by his pride and enthusiasm. He was a good psychiatrist and chemist, everyone I’d met since our engagement had agreed on that. And as frightening as this place was there was something impressive about how he seemed so at ease here.

He led me to an open door and stopped there. I looked inside and saw a large room with long tables full of equipment. At some of the tables people were working, putting tubes and vials together and doing things I didn’t understand with various liquids and powders. There was a sharp smell in the air like acid and something burning.

“This is the lab” Jonathan said. “We can’t go inside or we might disturb the chemists, but you can see from here. We ship drugs all over the country, even outside the country, but a large part of what we manufacture is used here at Arkham. After all we’re the top asylum for the criminally insane.”

“It’s very impressive” I said.

He nodded happily and took me into a storage room with rows of shelves full of bottles, jars and boxes.

“What do these drugs do?” I asked.

“Most of them are sedatives” he said. “But there are others too. I work extensively with hallucinogenics. It’s a fascinating field, very promising. They make the patients see and experience things that aren’t there, which is a crucial step in their treatment.”

“How so?”

“It’s a fantastic way to help them deal with trauma from the past, for example. Many of our patients have had horrible experiences that have triggered their mental illness. By giving them hallucinogenics I can bring back those memories and make them relive it. If they can face their fears instead of hiding them away, they have a much greater chance at improving.”

I nodded, impressed and frightened.

“Does anyone ever recover enough to be let out of here?” I asked.

“Yes, now and then” he said. “Many of our patients are gravely ill and will never recover enough to be a part of society again. But most improve, and some become well enough to transfer to Blackgate or get released when their sentence is over. But many of our treatments and therapies are still in development. I imagine in the future we will be able to get patients back into society at a much higher rate.”

I nodded.

“Until then they provide excellent means for research. We learn so much from working with these patients.”

We left the lab and the storage room and went back to his office.

“I’ve asked for tea” he said. “You might need a break before we go and see the patients. I usually go on a round once a day, and if you like you could come with me?”

He looked at me with glowing eyes. Part of me wanted to say no, I’ll wait here, but I felt like I would be letting him down if I did. And part of me wanted to see _them_. Wasn’t that why I had come?

“I would” I said, and he smiled.

“I hope you don’t mind if I get some work done before we go” he said and went to his desk.

“Not at all.”

The tea was already waiting. Jonathan poured us each a cup and sat down at his desk to go over the mail. I drank my tea in long gulps, relishing in the warmth and comfort it brought. I felt cold in here. Cold and small.

There was a knock on the door.

“Enter” Jonathan said.

The man I had seen at our wedding – Mr Bane – came in.

“Oh you have the missus here today” he said with a crooked smile. “Welcome Mrs Crane. I hope you like Arkham.”

“Well, it’s… impressive” I said. “But you could use some paintings, and curtains.”

He laughed.

“It sure could use a woman’s touch” he said, and then he ignored me and started to talk to Jonathan.

I listened but didn’t understand much. A patient, they called him the Joker, had been making trouble during the night, and apparently it wasn’t the first time. They discussed his medication for a while, and something about electric shock therapy, before Jonathan said he would come by and see him later. Bane bowed to me and left.

“I rely on him for everything” Jonathan said when the door had closed. “I couldn’t run this place without him.”

After I’d had a second cup of tea and Jonathan had finished his correspondence we went over to the cell block. It consisted of long dark corridors, only sparsely lit by gas lamps, with heavy steel doors to each cell. The smell was stronger here, and I stopped in my tracks. Jonathan looked at me.

“You don’t have to” he said. “I can take you back to my office, or order a carriage to take you home?”

“No. Sorry. I just… go on.”

He smiled and kissed my cheek.

“You’re so brave” he said. “I knew I made the right choice when I chose you.”

This spontaneous show of affection took me so much by surprise that I forgot to be afraid and only remembered it when we stopped by one of the cell doors. Jonathan opened a small hatch in the door, large enough to easily see through but too small to allow escape. He looked in, and then moved so I could see. I looked inside, my heart pounding in my chest. The room was empty except for a very simple cot and a bucket on the floor. On the cot was a man who seemed to be deeply asleep. He was dirty, his clothes torn and stained, his hair tangled and his face thin and unshaven. I gasped and pulled away from the hatch.

“He looks like an animal!” I said.

Jonathan smiled.

“Most of them do” he said. “This one has paranoid delusions. We mostly keep him heavily sedated and only wake him up for treatments, or he would hurt himself.”

My fear was partly replaced by sorrow. What a sad life. But then surely he had deserved it?

“What did he do?” I asked.

“He murdered his family” Jonathan said in a low voice. “Wife and three little girls.”

I looked at him and then at the door to the cell. I couldn’t believe I was so close to a man who would do such horrible things.

We saw a few others. Some were awake and stared blankly at us, others were asleep or sedated. All of them had done terrible things and I soon stopped asking. Bane was waiting outside the next door he took us to.

“This is the Joker” Jonathan told me and approached the door. “We call him that because you never quite know where you have him. He doesn’t respond to the drugs the way the others do. He can seem completely catatonic, for example, and then suddenly begin to speak. He jokes with us during treatment, he’s very good at pretending. Quite refreshing, though sometimes frustrating.”

I couldn’t understand the light, amused tone he used when he talked about his prisoners, as if they were dogs with various quirks to their personalities rather than evil men. Would I get so jaded eventually if I started working here?  

“Be careful” he said and opened the hatch. “He’s unpredictable.”

I looked inside. A fairly young, slim man was sitting on the cot looking at us. He was wearing black make-up around his eyes and what looked like reddish brown lipstick on his mouth, smeared out to paint a huge, terrifying grin.

“He does that all the time” Jonathan said when he saw my horrified reaction. “We keep cleaning his face off but he always finds ways of making himself up like that again. He uses his own blood to paint his lips, and when we cleaned his cell to prevent him from finding dirt for his eyes he just used his own shit. So now we let him keep some dirt. He smells better that way.”

He laughed, but I felt faint. Bane looked concerned.

“Maybe not a suitable story for a lady” he muttered.

Jonathan looked at me and stopped smiling. He took my arm.

“I’m so sorry” he said. “Do you need to sit down?”

“No. Yes, maybe…”

“Take her back to my office” Jonathan said to Bane. “I’ll get started on him.”

He kissed my forehead.

“Just rest a bit, I’ll be done here soon” he said. “I’ll send for more tea.”

The thought of going anywhere in here without him was terrifying, and I wanted to cry, but I said nothing as Bane led me down the corridor. He was like a giant next to me. Tall and unbelievably strong with hard muscles in the arm that held me and a strong masculine scent. I was used to Jonathan’s slight build, and other men in my social circle were generally either slim or fat, so Bane was like a creature from another world. When I had met him at our wedding he had worn a suit and hat, but in here he wore work clothes with a shirt open at the neck. If I hadn’t known who he was I could have mistaken him for one of the inmates.

“It’s madness to bring a lady in here” he muttered as we left the cell block and headed towards Jonathan’s office. “He’s such a show-off he’s willing to risk the health of his wife.”

“I would appreciate if you don’t talk about my husband like that” I said, offended on Jonathan’s behalf. “I asked to come.”

He looked right at me.

“Why?” he asked.

“I want to help. I have some nursing skills, my father is a doctor. And I want to be involved with my husband’s work.”

He looked thoughtful but didn’t say anything. Not until we were at Jonathan’s door did he speak again.

“Perhaps you do” he said. “You could help with the women, if you want.”

“Women?”

“Most of our inmates are men” Bane said and opened the door to the office. “But we have a few women. They killed their babies, or whacked their husbands, or just went plain hysterical. If you want to play nurse you could start there. Bring them food and medicine, help them bathe and change their clothes. A few of them keep whining about wanting their hair done, but who’s going to do that around here? Me?”

He laughed. I was just about to protest that I was no maid, but he left before I had a chance to say anything. I sat down next to Jonathan’s desk, all the strength in my legs had deserted me. Women here? Somehow that seemed more terrible than anything I had seen that day.


	7. Chapter 7

Jonathan left work early to take me home, but despite the short day I was exhausted when we got into the carriage. I looked out the window and tried to digest what I had seen. I didn’t know what to make of it, and I didn’t know how it made me feel about my husband. To think that he spent every day in that horrible place... Perhaps now I could understand him a little better.

Jonathan was quiet too on the way home. A couple of times it seemed like he was about to say something but changed his mind. It made me feel a little bad. I was sure he wanted to hear my impressions of Arkham, but I was too tired. When we got home he helped me inside and ordered tea before he put me in the drawing room and draped a blanket over my shoulders. His consideration moved me and I gave him a grateful smile.

“Are you all right?” he asked softly.

“Yes” I said and tried to smile. “It was just… I’m not used to that kind of environment, and there were so many new impressions.”

He smiled.

“What did you think?” he asked.

Roberts came in with the tea. Jonathan poured me a cup and I took a ham sandwich from the tray.

“I think it’s very impressive” I said. “I don’t know how you work with these terrible people all day.”

“You get used to it” he said. “And when you’re there every day you can see variations. How they respond to treatment, how we make progress. A lot of my work consists of research. Testing treatments and writing about them. I’ve been published quite a few times.”

I smiled.

“I know, I’ve heard. I’m so proud of you.”

He made a strange face and it took me a while to realize that he looked embarrassed. I laughed. He smiled.

“Would you still like to come and work with me?” he asked. “I understand if you’ve had enough. Bane is right, it really is no place for a lady.”

I thought about the female inmates I had seen. Some of them had been as dirty and ragged as the men, and the wild look in their eyes had scared me. But they were still women – someone’s daughter, sister, mother, wife.

“I would” I said. “But perhaps we could start slowly? Maybe one day a week? Would that be of any use to you?”

He smiled and my heart skipped a beat.  He was so beautiful and despite his strangeness he was mine.

“I would very much like to have you with me” he said. “As much or as little as you want. There is a lot of work that needs to be done, you don’t have to have any contact with the inmates if you don’t want to. It’s probably wisest if you don’t.”

I thought about the women again. I didn’t want to but I couldn’t keep them out of my head. It had never occurred to me that there could be women in an asylum. But I couldn’t see myself working with them, at least not now. I nodded and smiled.

“You stay home and rest and enjoy yourself the rest of this week” Jonathan said. “And come with me next week. How about that?”

“That sounds good” I said, relieved that I didn’t have to go back there just yet.

He smiled.

“Oh, I just remembered” he said. “I got the bill from the bookshop for the books you ordered. Is that all you want? I expected much more.”

“I can order more” I said and smiled, and this time it felt wholly genuine.

 

He didn’t touch me that night either. He hadn’t since that night when he almost killed me. At first I was relieved, but as time passed I was starting to worry about it. Did this mean I had to choose between rape and nothing? I knew we would need to do it if we were ever going to have children, so I had to solve this problem.

“Jonathan” I said when he had turned the light out but not yet fallen asleep.

He stirred.

“Yes?” he said.

“When I told you you can’t touch me without my consent…” I said, not sure how to phrase it. “I… if I were to say you have my consent, would you… I mean…. Is there another way…”

He was quiet for so long that I didn’t think he was going to answer.

“Let’s talk about it some other time” he said. “Go to sleep.”

I thought about it over the next few days but never got closer to a solution. I thought there must be a way that we could both enjoy it. When I touched myself it was pleasant and I had heard stories of bad women who enjoyed that sort of thing with men. Sinful or not, surely we could do something together that both of us found pleasure in? Or at least painless? Rachel had implied that it was possible, but of course she hadn’t told me how. But I couldn’t suggest something to Jonathan that I didn’t know, so I kept my silence and so did he.

 

It was at a party at the Dents that weekend that I heard the first hint that perhaps Jonathan’s reputation wasn’t as spotless as I had imagined. I had been dancing and was sitting down to rest when I heard a small group of gentlemen close to me. They had their back to me and didn’t see me sit there, or I’m sure they would never have spoken as they did.

“Is that Dr Crane over there? I wonder what really goes on at Arkham” one said. “You hear things, you know. People go there but nobody comes back.”

“Well” another said. “The prisoners there aren’t meant to get better, it’s just a place to keep them where they can’t do any harm.”

“Then why have an asylum at all? Why not just put everyone in Blackgate?” a third one asked.

The first one scoffed.

“Because they perform terrible experiments on them” he said. “Brain surgery and electric shocks, and drugs that turn you into a shadow of what you once were. At least that’s what I heard.”

“Heard where?” the third one said with contempt. “Been listening to ghost stories?”

“I actually heard it from my brother-in-law. His friend is an attorney and defended a man who had committed murder. Apparently Dr Crane testified in court and had him declared insane and recommended he be sentenced to Arkham. I hear he does that a lot. Everyone’s insane to him.”

“Well he wants the money. I don’t blame him. And men who commit murder and other unspeakable acts have it coming, don’t they?” the second man said.

“Well, the attorney friend tried to visit him at Arkham but was stopped at the gate. Some nonsense about security. Nobody gets to go in except for the people that work there.”

“The stories they could tell…”

“Now who’s listening to ghost stories?”

They all laughed and started to talk about something else, but I sat there with a cold feeling in my chest. I had thought everybody respected Jonathan, but these men had talked about him as something dark and corrupt. There had been an edge of excitement in their voices. I knew that he often testified in trials as an expert in psychology, but surely he would never use that position in order to secure more inmates to his asylum?

After the first shock passed I felt angry. These men knew nothing. I had been to Arkham and seen Jonathan’s passion for his work and his patients. The experiments these ignorant gentlemen had talked about must be referring to his research, which was done for the most altruistic reasons; to help his patients and develop drugs and treatments that would one day help them back to a normal life.

 

The following week I began my service as an Arkham employee. It was impossible for a woman of my station to take employment, but volunteer work was allowed.

I loved Jonathan’s obvious delight at having me there. In the first few weeks of our marriage I had worried that he didn’t like me, that his violent behaviour was somehow my fault. To see him appreciate me and my presence did me a world of good.

I started with simple administrative tasks. I took dictation from Jonathan and tidied up his notes and journals. It was interesting work and I stayed well away from the inmates. After a few weeks I was graduated to the lab where I helped the chemists with their notes and documents and worked on their filing system. After that I got to measure out the daily doses of drugs for each patient. I had mixed medicines for my father so it wasn’t new to me. The drugs themselves were unfamiliar at first, but all I had to do was read off a list and make sure the right doses of the right drugs went to the right patient.

The oppressive feeling of Arkham got to me in the beginning, but I gradually got used to it. After the first few weeks I felt less tired when I got home, and started to go with Jonathan twice a week instead of once.

“Are you sure it’s safe?” Rachel asked when we met after I had worked there for about a month.

“Completely sure” I said. “Jonathan and his colleagues are very skilled at handling dangerous people.”

Rachel shuddered.

“I don’t know how he does it” she said. “I would be so frightened.”

“I know” I said. “I don’t understand it either. But psychology is his passion, he loves to figure out how the mind works.”

“Is it true that they perform experiments on the prisoners?” Rachel asked, cheeks blushing.

“Of course not” I scoffed. “That would be highly unethical. They’re trying to help them.”

“Of course. I’m sorry.”

We talked about other things for a while. Then Rachel asked:

“So how is marriage life treating you so far?”

I looked at her, wondering if she meant what I thought she meant. She smiled knowingly.

“I don’t really know” I confessed. “I… I made him stop doing… things I’d rather he didn’t do. But since then he hasn’t really done anything.”

“Nothing?” Rachel said. “Complete drought?”

I nodded.

“That is not good. Men have needs, you know. If he doesn’t do anything with you, you can be certain he does it somewhere else.”

I gasped, horrified and offended.

“What are you insinuating?” I said.

She shrugged.

“I’m just saying” she said. “I’ve never heard of a man without an appetite. It needs to be satisfied somehow. If you made him stop with whatever he wants, you need to offer him something else.”

Her words stayed with me and troubled me. I had worried about how we would conceive a baby when nothing ever happened in the bedroom, but this problem had never even occurred to me. Did he go to someone else? When would he do that? He was always at work or at home with me. Surely she must be wrong. Several times I promised myself I would bring it up with Jonathan, but every time I lost my nerve. What would I say? I didn’t even have words for what our problem was, how could I ask him what he wanted? He might think I was accusing him of… I couldn’t even think it. I loved Rachel, but sometimes her mind was a dark and ugly place.

But as I kept working with Jonathan I noticed something. I started giving the drugs to the patients, and after a while he let me sit in on one of his treatment sessions. The patient, a man in his 40s, was brought into a treatment room and chained to a chair. Jonathan dissolved a powdered drug in water and told the man to drink, and after a while the man’s face began to change. His passive, apathetic expression turned to worry, anxiety and then pure fear. He feebly waved his chained hands in the air as if to protect himself from something only he could see. I sat at the back of the room, at a safe distance from the prisoner, and watched in horror as he started to cry.

“What do you see” Jonathan asked him. “Tell me.”

“My father” the inmate said in a hoarse voice.

“What is your father doing?”

“He’s taking his trousers off. No, daddy please don’t. Please…”

The inmate’s voice had become light and shrill as if imitating a child. It sent shivers down my spine.

“How old are you?” Jonathan asked.

“I just turned seven.”

“Good. Where are you?”

“In our cellar. He’s locked me in here, and now he’s coming to put his thing in me again. I don’t want to, please, it hurts! I’m so scared. Mother, help me!”

“Where is your mother?”

“She’s dead.”

“Tell me what your father is doing.”

The inmate’s voice dissolved into intense weeping and I couldn’t make out all the words. I was glad of that, since he told us the most horrifying story. I was struggling not to cry and wanted to beg Jonathan to stop, to help this poor man, calm him and comfort him. But instead Jonathan goaded him on, filled in details in the inmate’s story and asked him to repeat himself. I wondered how he could know. Had he heard this before?

As the poor inmate was getting increasingly closer to hysteria Jonathan stood up and yelled at him to keep going, keep telling the story, and I noticed the bulge in my husband’s pants. For a moment I was so horrified I couldn’t breathe. How could he feel excited here? Now? I thought perhaps I was mistaken but there were other signs and I remembered other times I’d seen him like this here. His eyes were shining, his mouth partly open even when he didn’t speak, and he was breathing quickly. The insight struck me suddenly and hard: _he likes this_.

“Excuse me” I said and ran for the door.

Jonathan looked at me as if he had forgotten I was there. The inmate started to scream without words. I stumbled into the corridor, closed the door and started to run. I didn’t even know where, but I soon found myself outside the staff privy. I wanted to throw up, but when I tried nothing came out. Instead I cried for a long time. That poor man, and Jonathan goading him on. Because it helped him, or because he liked it? I realized I had seen it before. Whenever I got frightened by something in here he was instantly by my side and eager to help, that same alert expression on his face, the shining eyes, the burning intensity. I had taken it for enthusiasm and passion, but maybe it was something else entirely. And Rachel’s words finally made perfect sense. _Find out what he needs._

“Fear” I whispered to myself. “He needs fear.”

There was a knock on the door, and I jumped.

“Selina?” Jonathan said. “Are you in there? I’ve been looking all over for you.”

“I am” I said. “I’m sorry, I’ll be out in a minute.”

“Please open the door.”

I wiped my tears and unlatched the door. He came in and took me in his arms.

“I’m so sorry” he said. “I should never have put you through that. It was thoughtless of me.”

I didn’t know what to say. I could feel his hardness pressing against me and it frightened and disgusted me. Did he not realize that I could feel it? Or did he want me to?

After a while I had calmed down enough to assure him I wouldn’t suffer any permanent damage.

“Why don’t you go on to my office and have some tea. I need to have a word with Bane, I’ll be there in a minute.”

I nodded.

Over the next week or so I wondered about what I had seen. After a few days I had almost convinced myself that I had drawn the wrong conclusion. Jonathan was a good man, he would never induce fear in another person for his own pleasure. Or if he did, what good did it do him? Surely he didn’t do bedtime things with his inmates, the thought was ridiculous. But then I saw something that confirmed my suspicions.

Jonathan was treating an inmate while I was delivering medicine to the female inmates when I discovered an error. I had done this enough times now to know what kind of medication each of the women were on, and one of them had gotten the wrong drug. I scolded myself for my mistake and hurried over to the storage to replace it. When I got there I found the explanation; the list of medication had been updated. I looked at it for a long time, wondering if this was really right. I came to the conclusion that I would need to check with Jonathan’s journals to make sure the woman’s medication had really been changed.

I was searching through Jonathan’s papers in the walk-in cabinet in his office when I heard someone come in. The door to the cabinet was almost closed but not quite and I was just going to find the right folder before I peeked my head out to say hello. But then I heard the strangest sounds.

“Hurry” Jonathan’s voice was hushed and strained.

“Hold your horses, boss” Bane said. “If you wouldn’t wear such complicated trousers…”

I put my eye to the crack in the door and saw Bane unfasten the buttons in Jonathan’s trousers and pull them down to his knees.

“Come on” Jonathan said impatiently.

He had a strange look on his face and looked oddly dishevelled.

“Have a good therapy session, did we?” Bane said with a grin. “Did you use the mask?”

Jonathan nodded and gave him a strained smile but then his face relaxed as Bane put his hand around his most private part and started to move it. I stared at them in shock and horror.

“Oh God” Jonathan gasped and then neither of them said anything for a while.

Bane moved his hand and Jonathan stood still, holding on to the desk as if for dear life, with a look of intense pleasure on his face. I stood as if frozen in place and watched the whole thing until he started to moan and I saw a white liquid come from his thing. I put my hands over my face and pressed hard to stop myself from screaming or crying. What if they found me in here? What would they do?

They didn’t. I heard them rustling about out there, and then they left. I waited a long time, trying to catch my breath and overcome the shock of what I had just witnessed. I didn’t know what to make of it. Was this what Rachel meant about going somewhere else to satisfy his needs? I had in my darkest moments imagined another woman, a mistress who allowed him to rape her. Not this… whatever it was. Was it my fault? Was he forced to do this because I wouldn’t let him touch me the way he wanted? It looked like they had done this before, but there was no way to tell how long.

I finally managed to compose myself enough to walk back to the women’s ward and finish distributing the drugs.


	8. Chapter 8

I was off balance for quite some time after what I had seen. It was difficult to meet Jonathan’s eyes and speak to him about ordinary things. My mind kept returning again and again to the image of him and Bane in his office and trying to understand what it meant. In my prayers I apologized for him over and over and begged the Lord’s mercy on his sinful ways.

Sometimes I felt certain that the only way to save my own soul was to quit working at Arkham. There were plenty of corrupting things to see there. I had started to work more closely with the female inmates and one time I saw one of them touch herself. I was horrified and turned to the male guard who was with me to make sure I was safe. He snickered.

“They do that a lot, both men and women” he said. “Just avert your eyes if it bothers you, she’ll finish soon enough.”

I did, but I couldn’t stop thinking about it. That night I dreamed about it. In my dream the woman looked right at me, her face full of pleasure while she continued to stroke and finger herself with increasing intensity, and I woke up with a desire to do the same myself so strong I couldn’t resist. I glanced anxiously at Jonathan but he was asleep and didn’t notice what I was doing. When the pleasure overwhelmed me it was stronger than anything I’d felt before, and I just lay there overcome by the feeling for a long time before I even started to feel guilty about it. Was that what Jonathan felt when Bane touched him? When he raped me?

And as much as I thought about quitting Arkham I never did. It had come to mean a lot to me, both helping the inmates and working with Jonathan. We had something to share, something that mattered that we could talk about in the evenings. I continued to read some of his textbooks and learned more and more about the psychology of what he was doing.

One day, shortly after my experience with the female inmate and my dream, I was alone at home and found a book in Jonathan’s library titled “The sexuality of the criminally insane.” I took it from the shelf with trembling fingers, looked around to make sure none of the servants saw me, and then sat down with it.

I didn’t know what I had expected when I saw the title, but leafing through the book took my breath away. There were detailed descriptions of different types of behavior, their possible causes and – if needed – treatments. But more than that; there were pictures. I couldn’t pull myself away from them and looked with a mix of horror and breathtaking excitement at the detailed drawings of very private body parts involved in the most unspeakable acts. My face burned. Had Jonathan read this?

When I finally managed to tear myself away from the book my whole body was in an uproar. My heart was pounding, I was breathing fast as if I had exerted myself and I felt hot and flustered. My privates ached, burned and itched with a longing I didn’t quite recognize. I locked myself in our bedroom, lay down on the bed and pulled my skirts up. I fingered myself while a confusing chaos of pictures – inmates, Jonathan and the drawings from the book – flashed through my mind. After I was finished I arranged my skirts again and realized I wanted to do this with Jonathan. The pictures I had seen – there were so many ways two people could do this. I tried to remind myself that the book was about the criminally insane, but that didn’t help. The idea was stuck in my mind, and refused to leave.

In the hours while I waited for Jonathan to come home I devised a plan. If Jonathan wanted fear I would give him fear. Just not mine.

 

That night I waited with a pounding heart and nerves on end for Jonathan to fall asleep. As soon as I was certain he was, I took out the ribbons I had hidden and carefully tied his hands and feet to the bed. He twitched a little when I accidentally tickled his foot, but didn’t turn around or wake up. _I can’t believe I’m doing this_ , I thought as I fastened the last knot. I should have let him go before I went any further, but that didn’t feel like an option anymore. There was a fire burning inside me that seemed to consume my inhibitions and kept my conscience away.

I fished out the knife I had hidden under the bed and then stood over my sleeping husband. _If my mother could see me now_ I thought and almost abandoned the whole plan. But my mother couldn’t see me now. She was in her own bedroom with her own husband and who knew what they were doing. I felt a surge of anger. Why hadn’t anyone taught me this? How could the church preach abstinence and purity when sexual acts were necessary to make children? We had to deal with it one way or another. It was shameful that I had to learn about these things from the criminally insane, and the shame was not on me.

I lit a candle on the bedside table and then sat down on the bed, my heart pounding and my stomach full of anxious anticipation. 

“Jonathan!” I said in a loud, sharp voice.

He startled, and opened his eyes. He looked at me.

“What’s wrong?” he asked sleepily and made a move to sit up but discovered he couldn’t.

He looked at his hands.

“Selina, what…” he began but I interrupted him.

“Be quiet”

“Selina, untie me at once! What are you doing?”

He sounded angry, but also afraid.

“Be quiet” I said. “You’re going to do exactly what I say, or I will cut you.”

I put the knife to his throat. It was a small knife, made for peeling fruit rather than hurting people, but it was still a knife. Jonathan looked at it in complete confusion. It was wonderfully satisfying.

“Let me go!” he said.

I pressed the knife against his throat and was both frightened and excited when I saw a small drop of blood. _Good Lord have mercy_ , I thought. _I’m as deranged as he is_. He made a small noise of pain and surprise, and I saw the confusion in his eyes give way to fear.

“I’m going to take your clothes off” I said. “I’m putting the knife down, but if you give me any trouble I will cut you. Understand?”

He nodded. I put the knife on the bedside table and started to unbutton his pajama shirt. I opened it and pulled my hands over his chest. The skin was smooth and hairless and very warm. Then I pulled his trousers down. I couldn’t take them off because of the ties on his feet, but it didn’t matter. I was richly rewarded. His thing (“penis” I reminded myself. That’s what it was called, I had learned from the book) was big and hard and stood straight up. It looked terrifying and exciting and ridiculous all at the same time and I felt a surge of pleasure because this man and his intriguing body was mine and I controlled him.

“Like this, do you?” I asked.

He nodded and smiled a little, still looking scared but also excited. I took the knife and put it against his penis.

“Maybe I don’t want you to” I said. “Maybe I want it to lie down, all nice and soft.”

“I… I can’t do that…” he said.

“I didn’t ask you what you can do. I’m telling you. Or I’ll cut it off.”

I pushed the knife a little harder against the soft skin, but not hard enough to draw blood. He gasped and pulled at his restraints and then he whined like a frightened puppy.

“Selina, it’s enough. Untie me” he pleaded. “Please....”

“Be quiet!” I barked. “You speak only when I allow you to!”

I decided I’d had enough, I was in way over my head and needed to finish this now. I climbed on top of him, hitched up my nightgown and then let my body sink down over him, slowly, slowly. It felt so good when he slipped inside me. He let out a soft wailing sound and at first I thought I had hurt him for real. But the look on his face made it clear that I hadn’t. I moved slowly up and down, exploring the way it felt. It felt very good. When I pushed down I pressed myself against him and that felt even better. The look on his face – both the fear and the pleasure – made it feel better still. He moaned in time with my movements, and soon so did I.

Then his whole body went tense and he made a sound like half a scream. I recognized the look on his face and knew he had spent himself inside me. I hadn’t quite reached the height of my pleasure, and it was disappointing to feel him become soft inside me. He didn’t seem to notice. He had thrown his head back and was breathing hard, still moaning with the pleasure.

“Oh my God” he groaned. “That was the best. I have never… Oh my God.”

I grabbed the knife again and held it against his throat. The look of drowsy pleasure was mingled with confusion and fear.

“I didn’t finish” I said. “Did you think this was for you?”

“Um… Well, no of course. I’m sorry. Let me help you.”

“How?”

“Untie me and let me try.”

I did. He motioned at me to lie down and then I felt his hands on me. He didn’t seem afraid now, but still excited. I tensed when he slipped his fingers inside me, but it felt so good I didn’t mind the intrusion. He moved his fingers inside me, and the other hand on the outside, and brought me to pleasure just as intense as I had done myself that night after my dream. Afterwards I lay still in the bed not sure what to do with myself. I didn’t know where this make-believe ended and the real me began. I had enjoyed it too. What was wrong with me?

“Can I speak?” Jonathan asked after a little while.

“Yes” I said. “We can go back to normal.”

“Thank you” he said and looked at me. “Really, thank you. I love you.”

“I love you too” I said.

I didn’t know if I did, but what else could I say? The things we had done tonight tied us together harder than any wedding vows.

 


	9. Chapter 9

I woke up the next morning feeling strange and uncomfortable. I regretted what I had done last night, but at the same time I didn’t. It had been a fantastic experience, but I wished someone else had done it so that I could have my purity intact. And my immortal soul.

Jonathan was happy. He was smiling as he got up, but then he looked at me and noticed my distressed look.

“How are you?” he asked.

I shook my head.

“I don’t know. Will I go to hell now? For what I did?”

He laughed, but when he noticed I didn’t, he stopped. He sat down next to me on the bedside.

“No, of course not” he said. “Heaven and hell and just stories. Make-believe. Surely you don’t believe in all that?”

“Well, I… you don’t?”

“No” he said. “There might be a God somewhere, I don’t know. But I don’t believe what the priests tell me. I’m a scientist. I see every day how my drugs and therapies help people, not God.”

“I saw one of the women touch herself” I said.

He smiled.

“That’s common among the insane” he said. “When the mind is broken it’s unable to conform to society’s rules. They have no inhibitions. In a way, they’re freer than we’ll ever be.”

I looked at him, at the fire in his eyes, and for just a moment I could see him in one of the cells in Arkham. Then the image disappeared and I promised myself I would never think about it again.

“Come” he said and took my hand. “Let’s have breakfast.”

 

After Jonathan had left for work that morning I went straight to church. I sat in one of the pews and prayed hard for forgiveness for what we had done. What Jonathan had told me about his thoughts on religion didn’t help me feel any better. But neither did prayer.

Whether the devil had gotten inside me, or something else, after that night I had an itch in my body. I wanted to do it again. I tried to stop myself from thinking about it, but I couldn’t. I thought about touching myself again, but it wasn’t enough. I wanted to do it with him.

When he come home we were both tense and awkward. He talked about his day and neither of us said a word about the previous night. While he was talking I caught myself looking at him, thinking about how he looked under his suit. I remembered the face he made when he reached the height of his pleasure (“orgasm” the book called it) and I felt my heart beat faster and the place between my legs grow hot and damp.

We went to bed without speaking, other than a polite “good night, dear”, and turned the lights off. I tried to sleep but was too aware of his presence, his body under his pajamas, only inches away from me. I could feel his body heat and smell him and it felt like I was going insane.

“Are you awake?” he whispered after a while.

“Yes.”

“What we did last night…” he said.

I lay tense and anxious, waiting for him to continue.

“Would you…” he said and hesitated. “Would you like to do it again? Did you enjoy it?”

I knew I had to say no, that I was a Christian woman and we could never speak of this ever again. But my treacherous body was on fire and my mouth opened and said:

“Yes.”

“You wouldn’t need the knife” he said. “Unless you want it, of course. Just… tie me down.”

“Why… I mean… You like that?”

“It scares me.”

“Why does fear… make you… “

“I don’t know” he said. “It just does.”

I didn’t believe him. He was a psychiatrist, of course he knew. His nightmares… something must have happened. I knew enough from his books now to see the signs. The book about the sexuality of the criminally insane said that two common symptoms of mental illness were nightmares and sexual fixations. But now was not the time to dwell on that.

I lit the candle beside the bed. Jonathan was looking at me, his eyes dark and gleaming in the dim light. His lips were slightly parted and I could see how excited he was without needing to see the bulge under his pajamas. He was glowing with it, and I felt my own desire grow even stronger. I took out the ribbons from where I had hidden them in my bedside table. Jonathan’s eyes followed my movements and I could see him get tense when I moved his hand to the bed post. I started to tie the ribbon around his wrist and felt his hand tremble. I looked at him, at the fear in his eyes. It was unsettling, but also somehow moving. He trusted me enough to let me do something that scared him, even though he knew there was pleasure in it for him too.

I tied down the other hand too. His breath seemed to catch in his throat and he swallowed hard.

“Feet too?” I asked.

He nodded.

When he was completely tied down I looked at him lying there, helpless. His eyes so big, so full of fear and excitement. I liked it.

I got off the bed.

“Perhaps I should just leave you here” I said.

He stared at me.

“No” he said, but it came out as a whisper. “Please don’t.”

“What’s to stop me?”

“Selina…”

He tugged at the ribbons that held his hands, but they didn’t give. He started breathing faster, his face frozen in terror. For a moment I was tempted to carry on and see if I could push him into a full-blown panic, the way I had seen him do to his patient. I was pretty sure I could. But then I returned to my senses and to the bed, trying to hide how ashamed I felt.

I sat on his legs and started to unbutton his pajamas. I freed his thing from his trousers and watched it stand straight out from his body. I touched it carefully, stroked it with one finger. Jonathan gasped. The skin was hot and so very soft. I hadn’t expected that. I closed my hand around it and heard Jonathan breathe faster. I gripped harder and he whined.

“That hurts” he said. “But it feels good too.”

It was fascinating. That thing controlled him, and I controlled it. I pulled my nightgown off and moved closer so I could press my own thing against his. It felt nice and I started to rub myself against him. He closed his eyes and moaned. I did it a little faster. His skin was so hot and soft but underneath it he was so hard. I loved the contrasts, the mix of rough and delicate. I finally lifted my hips up so I could ease him inside me and then let my hips sink back down. He moaned again and so did I when he filled me up. Did all women feel like this? Did they all have to figure it out for themselves, or did some of them know? How?

I moved my hips up and down and tried to find a good rhythm. Jonathan helped me, pushing his hips up to meet me. That pushed him deeper inside me, and it felt wonderful. But I missed the sensation of rubbing my outside against him, so I tried with my hand. It felt so good I forgot all about him, the bed, the ribbons tying him down. I closed my eyes and let my body move on its own, following its own rhythm. Just as I thought it couldn’t possibly feel better, something seemed to explode inside me and I heard myself make a whining, moaning noise. I couldn’t believe it was really me, it sounded like an animal. When the pleasure started to fade I opened my eyes and looked at Jonathan. He stared at me in fascination, lust and fear, and he was so beautiful I got tears in my eyes. He continued to move his hips and then he reached his peak too, leaned his head back and breathed hard, moaning.

After he stopped moving everything was still. I remained sitting on him, his thing inside me although soft now. He opened his eyes and gave me a quick smile, but then looked anxious and glanced at the ribbons holding his hands.

“Please untie me” he said.

I nodded and got up on my knees so I could reach. I felt him slip out of me and something warm and slippery ran down my leg. I looked at it. Jonathan saw me look.

“Maybe we made a baby now” he said.

I looked at the slimy stuff dripping out of me. It was strange, an almost sacred experience, and at the same time ridiculous, to think that this sticky substance, produced under such undignified circumstances, held the secret to new life. I smiled.

“I hope so” I said.

I untied him. He rubbed his wrists, which were red where he had pulled at his restraints. Then he smiled.

“I…” he said. “I didn’t know it could feel like this. Thank you.”

“Thank _you_ ” I said.

I lay down next to him and rested my head on his shoulder. I thought he might be insane, and that I might be too. And that I loved him.

 

The next day I went to the fabric shop and ordered some more ribbon. I chose carefully before making my order. They had to be strong enough to hold Jonathan to the bed but soft enough to not dig into his wrists. The shopkeeper asked me if I was making a new hat. I said yes.


	10. Chapter 10

”How did this happen?”

I carefully cleaned the cut on Ivy’s hand. She was one of the female inmates at Arkham and had become something of a favorite for me. She was calmer than the others, less prone to tears or hysterics, and when she was clear enough to speak she could be nice and funny. Unlike Nyssa who always talked about sucking men’s privates. She must either be very fond of it or have some sort of trauma related to it, because it was all she ever talked about. At first I had been horrified, but now I barely heard her anymore.

Ivy shrugged. The cut on her hand was deep and ugly. I knew they hurt themselves sometimes, and occasionally each other although that was less common, but it was hard to imagine someone doing this to themselves.

“You’re nice” she said. “Not like him.”

“Him?”

“The doctor.”

“You mean Dr Crane?”

She nodded and averted her eyes.

“He only does what’s best for you” I assured her.

She met my eyes and the look in hers sent shivers down my spine. I looked at the cut again, cleaned and bandaged it in silence. I had taken on more and more of the duties of a nurse lately. It seemed a waste not to put my experience from helping my father to use. I took care of injuries and physical illnesses, always with a male guard by my side in case the inmate became confused or aggressive. It rarely happened, they either seemed to understand that I was helping them or if they didn’t they were usually too heavily drugged to put up a fight.

There were some inmates I wasn’t allowed to work with except to distribute medication. The Joker was one of them. I still didn’t know his real name, everyone just called him the Joker. I was allowed to give him his medication through the hatch in the door, but not go inside his cell or meet him outside of it. I had only seen him moved once, when Bane took him from his cell to a therapy room. I was at the far end of the corridor but could still see that they had him in a straightjacket. It made me cold with fear and I wondered how people like that could exist. Why did God allow them to live? Jonathan told me he had killed several people, only for the fun of it.

“Marriage becomes the good doctor” the Joker said when I put the little paper cup of medicine through the hatch. “He looks so happy now. Rosy cheeks, a new spring in his step.”

I didn’t know what to say. He hadn’t really spoken to me before, except casual greetings or talk about the weather – which was odd enough since he had a cell with no windows and was never outside. What did he know about the weather? Part of me felt I should leave right away and not listen to him, but my training to always be civil and polite went too deep to allow me to leave in the middle of a conversation.

“I’m glad to hear it” I said.

He took the cup and swallowed his drugs.

“You must be very pleasing in bed” he said in the same light, pleasant tone. “He hasn’t raped anyone in a while.”

I froze. I couldn’t take in what he had said at first, and then the memories of the times Jonathan had raped me flashed through my mind and made my throat constrict. We had continued to enjoy each other with him tied to the bed and I liked it as much as he did now, but it only worked if I never thought about those dark times in the beginning of our marriage. I had written them off as a mistake and made sure to keep them out of my mind.

The Joker seemed to notice how unsettled I was.

“Surely you knew?” he said. “That your better half is… how shall I put it… missing a few screws in the sexual department? Have you figured out yet what makes him tick?”

I was so embarrassed and uncomfortable I didn’t know what to do with myself. _Shut the hatch and go_! I told myself, but I couldn’t move. He laughed – very loud – and made me jump.

“You have!” he said, sounding delighted. “Oh, good for you! And you enjoy it too, don’t you? I can tell from the pretty roses on your cheeks. What is it that takes your fancy? Roleplay? Do you use his mask?”

Mask? What mask?

“Oh he hasn’t told you about that?” the Joker said, his tone soft and friendly. “You should ask him. He has this mask, you see, that he uses to frighten the inmates. He used it on me, of course, and I have to say it was _very_ entertaining.”

“Your therapy does not concern me” I said stiffly.

He laughed again.

“Therapy?” he said. “Is that what he calls it? That’s sweet. Did you know he likes to frighten his inmates half to death, and then masturbate? Of course, he doesn’t do it as much now that he has you.”

I was starting to feel faint. The image of Bane touching Jonathan in his special place flashed before my mind.

“And that’s when he doesn’t _actually_ scare them to death” the Joker said with a smile as if it was all a joke. “The death toll in this place is quite remarkable. So many heart attacks. Isn’t it strange that so many criminally insane have such weak hearts? Or maybe it’s something to do with the doctor and his drugs. What do I know, I’m just a nut myself.”

He laughed again, and this time the laughter sounded mean as if he was enjoying upsetting me and didn’t care that I knew. I shut the hatch and walked away with the sound of his laughter ringing in my ears. I asked one of the caretakers to finish distributing the medicines. I could tell that he was annoyed that he had to do my job, but he couldn’t say anything to the doctor’s wife, so he just took the tray and went. I headed for the small storage room that had become my nurse’s station. I had tried to decorate it so it felt a little warmer and friendlier than the rest of the place, but it was still very much a part of Arkham with its plain painted walls and smell of animal and antiseptic.

I closed the door and sat down at my little desk, breathing hard and hands shaking. I tried to ignore what the Joker had said, but of course I couldn’t. I had seen Jonathan frighten his patients in therapy, although I had refused to take part after that first time, and I knew fear did something to him, his own fear as well as others’. But to go from that to actually touching himself during therapy was a big step. But what he’d been doing with Bane… if he could do that, couldn’t he do other things as well? I sat there feeling cold and sick. I had thought I was getting to know him, our nights of pleasure were bringing us so close together. To think he had such horrible secrets… perhaps I didn’t know him at all. Could he even be dangerous to me? I thought about that time when he had almost strangled me, and felt close to panic.

I couldn’t stand the thought. I told myself not to be such an idiot as to listen to a madman. Jonathan had even warned me that the Joker liked to play jokes on people – it was how he had earned his nickname after all. He enjoyed upsetting and confusing people, and I had stepped right into his trap as the silly girl I was.

And there was one part of his claims I could actually check. All that nonsense about the mortality rate at Arkham. There were journals, everything was written down. All I had to do was look through the archive and I could see exactly who had died, when and from what cause.

It made me feel calmer. I would prove the Joker wrong and then I could ignore everything he said.

 

It took a while before I had a chance to look through the archives. I only worked three days a week, and during those days I was either too busy or I couldn’t find enough time to go through Jonathan’s things without him discovering me. I could of course have asked permission to look over his files, but then I would have to admit I had listened to the Joker’s stories, and I’d rather not do that.

Then an opportunity presented itself.

“I have to testify in court next week” Jonathan said when he came home from work. “It’s a murder trial and they’ve asked me to assess the defendant’s mental state. I’ll have to put everything else aside for the next few days and focus on the material on him.”

“When are you going to appear in court?”

“On Wednesday. Do you want to come? It will be horribly boring for you, I’m sure. Perhaps you should take the day off?”

“There’s no need for that” I said. “I’ll go to Arkham as usual.”

He looked at me with love and respect in his eyes, and I felt like I grew another inch under that look.

“You’re so dedicated to your work” he said fondly.

I smiled.

“Will you be gone all day?” I asked.

“I’m afraid so. I’ll have to ask Bane to take my treatments, the ones that can’t be postponed.”

“I’m sure he’ll do fine. Let me know if I can help with anything.”

“I will” he said and caressed my hair. “What would I do without you?”

 

I felt a little guilty as I went into Jonathan’s archive in his office as soon as Bane started a therapy session and Jonathan was in court. I started with the latest folder and took it to Jonathan’s desk. I skimmed through all the new arrivals, their diagnosis and medication, recommended therapies and short notes on results. It was fascinating reading and I had to remind myself that wasn’t what I was looking for. I looked for files that ended with “deceased” and made notes of who, when and why. It wasn’t so bad at first, but when my page of notes started to fill up and I had to add another I started to feel uncomfortable. I looked at the dates. So many… Then I looked at the causes of death. A lot of them were heart attacks, but there were others too. Accidents, illness. It was neither strange nor unexpected: the inmates here led a dangerous life just by being insane. They had such an unnatural life in so many ways – never spending time outside, the medication they got, being either catatonic or in hysterics, limited social contacts and very little interest in personal hygiene. All of that caused illnesses and injuries at a much higher rate than in normal people.

But then I started to notice things that weren’t right. Several patients were said to have died during a cholera epidemic, at a time when I had been at the asylum and had seen no evidence of an epidemic of any sort, not to mention cholera. Cholera was a violent, messy disease, and would be impossible to hide even if there had been reason to hide it from me. On the contrary, if there had been a cholera outbreak Jonathan would have made sure to inform me and try to protect me as much as he could.

Why would someone fake a cholera epidemic? Then I noticed other things. Patients that I knew had died were listed as still living, with notes about their treatments as if they were alive. I checked and double checked several times, with cold shivers running down my spine. I even went to check one of their cells, a man who had died in his sleep and been taken out on a stretcher right before my eyes to be cremated in the Arkham crematorium only last week. I opened the hatch with shaking fingers, but the cell was empty just as I had known it would be.

I went back to the files and tried to find a reason. It couldn’t be what the Joker had said, that Jonathan scared his patients to death. But then what was it? I never found any other explanation, and had to put the files back and continue with my work with all my questions unanswered.

 

That evening I was distracted and uncomfortable. When I was waiting for Jonathan to come home from court I thought about wanting to ask him about the mortality rate of Arkham, but couldn’t find a way to phrase it without it sounding like an accusation. When he did come home he was in a bad mood.

“How was court?” I asked as we sat down to dinner.

He didn’t answer at first. He sat staring at his food, immobile and silent.

“Jonathan?” I asked. “Dear, are you alright?”

He looked at me. There was anxiety in his eyes and his body seemed very tense.

“They didn’t believe my testimony” he said, his voice sounding hard and upset. “The prosecutor was very disrespectful, questioning my competence, and one of the attorneys all but accused me of declaring everyone insane so I could fill my asylum with guinea pigs!”

I could understand that he was offended and upset by that, but there was something else too. Fear. He was scared, but of what?

“That must have been very hard” I said softly. “Clearly they are the incompetent ones.”

He nodded intensely.

“Try and eat, love” I said.

He stared at his plate again, but finally got up from the table.

“I can’t” he said. “I’ll be in the library, but I would not like to be disturbed.”

He left, and I had to finish my meal alone, my head full of confusing thoughts. He seemed calmer when we went to bed, but that night he had one of his nightmares.

“Please don’t” he pleaded, weeping in his sleep.

It broke my heart to hear him. I was just about to wake him up when he continued.

“Don’t leave me in here, mother, please! I’m so afraid of the dark!”

I went cold all over. His voice was so clear as if he was awake and talking to me, but he was so clearly somewhere else, and some _time_ else as well. He didn’t say anything more for a while, only cried quietly and moved restlessly in his sleep.

“I’ll be good” he said then, in a very small, weak voice. “I’ll do anything you want, just please let me out.”

I found myself weeping as well. That voice, despite belonging to a grown man, was so clearly that of a child who had already given up all hope.

“Jonathan, love, you’re having a nightmare” I said and shook his shoulder.

He woke up and looked at me, looking so lost he made me cry harder. I put my arms around him.

“Selina?” he said after a little while. “Are you all right?”

“Yes” I said, even though it wasn’t strictly true.

“What’s wrong? Are you crying?”

I wiped my tears, embarrassed on his behalf that I had heard something so private.

“I’m sorry” I said. “It’s just… I heard what you said, in your dream. It was so sad.”

He looked at me and seemed guarded, even suspicious.

“What did I say?” he asked.

“You…you were talking to your mother, I think” I said, reluctant to repeat what I had heard. “You asked her not to lock you up?”

He didn’t say anything.

“Did she really do that?” I finally asked.

He looked at me, and at first he looked defiant, but then it was as if the air went out of him and he looked sad and tired. He nodded.

“She wasn’t well” he said. “She did many things that… that left traces in me. Permanent damage.”

“You must have been so afraid” I said and caressed his hair.

“I don’t want to think about that again. I can’t control what I dream, but I don’t think about those times when I’m awake. Just go back to sleep.”

“Of course. Do you… would it help if we…”

I made an awkward gesture at his crotch. He shook his head.

“Not now” he said. “Just go back to sleep.”

I nodded.

“Do you want me to hold you?” I asked.

“Yes please.”

I put my arms around him again and felt the smell of his hair and the warmth of his skin while his breathing slowed down and he settled into a peaceful sleep. It took time for me to go back to sleep. I felt trapped in a confusing mix of feelings. I felt sorry for him, I wanted to help and I loved him, while at the same time I was afraid of him. 


	11. Chapter 11

Over the next few days I thought a lot about the mysterious deaths at Arkham. I tried to figure it out for myself, look in Jonathan’s books for clues and thought about ways to ask him, but I didn’t get any closer to an answer. Sometimes it scared me. If there was any truth in the Joker’s accusations, then what? Did that make my husband a murderer? At other times I told myself not to worry about it. Arkham was full of the world’s worst criminals, who cared what happened to them? Their treatments needed to be extreme to fit their extreme problems, with that in mind it was an acceptable side effect if some of them died.

On one of my days off from Arkham Jonathan came home with something wrapped in a parcel. He gave me a secretive smile and put it away in the bedroom.

“I’ll show you later” he said and sat down to dinner.

He was in a good mood and we chatted about work and even gossiped a bit about our neighbors.

When we got ready for bed he showed me the parcel.

“We got a new shipment today” he said. “And I took one home. We don’t need that many anyway.”

He unfolded a large piece of white fabric. At first I thought it was a shirt, but then I realized it was a straightjacket. I looked at him. He had a feverish look to him – flushed cheeks and that intense look in his eyes. He pushed a strand of black hair out of his face and I was struck again by how beautiful he was – beautiful and frightening.

“I got this too” he said after a moment’s hesitation and held up a small glass vial.

“What is it?”

“It’s a diluted version of one of the drugs I use at the asylum. It enhances emotions. Fear, for example.”

It felt like my mind stopped working and my heart froze. This was too wrong, too close to what the Joker had said.

“Why…” I said almost in a whisper, struggling to make my mouth shape words. “Why do you have drugs that do that?”

He looked annoyed, as if that was a stupid question.

“It helps the inmates overcome their inhibitions. It works as a kind of catharsis” he said impatiently.

I looked at the vial and the implications of horror it held. I felt certain the inmates had no choice whether they used this drug or not. I had the sensation of doors opening in my mind. If he used this on his patients, what other means did he have of affecting their emotions without their consent? I remembered what the Joker had said about torture.

“Are you sure this is right?” I asked, meaning the use of the drug both at Arkham and in our bedroom.

If we did this, what was the difference between us and the inmates at Arkham, except that we had a choice and knew what we were doing?

“I’ve used it before” he said in a careless tone. “I’ve diluted it myself, the concentration is exactly right to give a mild reaction but still be perfectly safe.”

I wanted to ask what concentration the inmates were receiving, but then I registered what he had actually said.

“ _How_ have you used it before?”

I had to force myself to ask, but I _had_ to know. He looked awkward and embarrassed.

“Well…” he said. “When I was living alone…”

He made a vague gesture as if to say _what else can one do?_ I nodded that he didn’t have to go on. I could picture it all too well, and the horror I felt started to give way to pity. It was better for him that we did this together, rather than on his own. I could worry about Arkham later.

“All right” I said. “We’ll try this, but if it’s dangerous in any way…”

“It’s not! I promise.”

“Is there an antidote?”

“No, but it wears off quickly. If the effects remain after we’re done, just do what you do when I have nightmares. That’s very effective.”

He smiled, and I couldn’t understand how he could seem so happy with this arrangement.

“Fine.”

I started to undress him. I was very uncomfortable at first, but as each garment came off and more and more of his beautiful body became visible I started to feel increasingly excited. So did he. I could sense the tension in his body and see his naked chest rise and fall with his breaths. His hands opened and closed and he swallowed in anticipation. When I got his trousers off his excitement became obvious in all its glory. He took the vial and swallowed the contents, and then gestured at me to put the straightjacket on. I took the straightjacket and held it up so he could put his arms in it. I could feel him tremble as I fastened it at the back.

“Turn around” I said.

He did, and I looked at him. There was something oddly arousing about seeing him in the straightjacket, more than when he was tied down with my ribbons. It looked so sturdy with its rough linen and strong straps. If he really panicked he could probably tear free of my ribbons, but with this thing he was entirely dependent on me. I could leave him to die if I wanted, he would never get out without help.

I smiled at him but he didn’t smile back. He looked terrified. The mix of fear and excitement he usually had on his face when I tied him down was replaced with pure terror. Only his naked sex revealed excitement.

“Is the drug working?” I asked.

He nodded.

“Lie down” I ordered him.

He did as I said but he was so tense he could barely move. I caressed him all over and could feel his hard muscles under the rough fabric of the straightjacket. I touched his face, followed the beautiful shapes of it, pulled my fingers through his hair and drowned in his eyes, big and intense with fear. I loved it and I loved him, but I was also worried. I had never seen him quite like this.

“Are you all right?” I asked.

He didn’t answer, he just stared at me.

“Would you like me to let you out?” I asked.

He nodded quickly, desperately. I hesitated. Should I let him out, or take a chance and go with it? If he was too terrified to even speak, that was bad. Or it could be good. Part of me liked this. It was a little like revenge for those times that he had raped me. And this was the only time in my life that I was completely in charge of a man. I wouldn’t let him out because he wanted it. I would only let him out if _I_ wanted it.

“I’m not going to” I said. “You’re stuck there now and it suits me fine.”

He started breathing faster and I could see tears pooling in the corners of his eyes before they trickled down his temples. I almost gave in, but his penis was still stiff and I put my hand on it instead.

“Close your eyes” I said softly and closed my hand around him.

He did as I said and I started to move my hand slowly back and forth.

“You’re alone in the dark” I said. “I’ve left you there.”

He made a whimpering sound and he was breathing so fast and shallow now I was worried he might faint.

“But it’s all right” I said. “Because in the dark it feels like this. And when you’re done, I will come back for you.”

I put my mouth around the tip of his penis. It would never have occurred to me to try that if I hadn’t heard Nyssa at Arkham talk about it. The effect was most satisfactory. Jonathan made a short, loud sound almost like a bark. I went on, slowly, carefully and he whined like a puppy. It both tasted and smelled funny, but not exactly unpleasant. After a while I stopped and looked at him. Nobody who had seen him in society would recognize him now. He was sweating and his face was contorted with fear and pleasure. I wondered what it felt like for him. It must be so intense, and I was almost a little envious at the same time as I pitied him. What would he be like if he was normal? If his mother hadn’t done whatever she did to him?

“Don’t stop” he said in a hoarse whisper. “Please, let me come. Let me out.”

“No.”

He cried quietly while I stroked him with my hand again while touching myself at the same time. I liked doing this and looking at him lying there helpless, a beautiful mess. When I couldn’t wait anymore I straddled him and pushed down so that he slid inside me. It felt wonderful and we both gasped. I moved around to find the perfect angle and then the right rhythm.

“I’ll come” he said after a little while.

“No, you won’t. Not until I’m finished. Or I’ll lock you in the dark forever.”

He bit his teeth together, his eyes still closed. He had long eyelashes and freckles on his nose and cheeks and I wanted to cry when I looked at him. I had never known a man could be so pretty.

Finally I felt the peak of my pleasure within reach.

“You may come” I said and then heard myself moan when the pleasure washed over me.

He tensed his hips and pushed himself deeper inside me, one, two, three, four times and then he threw his head back and screamed. I looked at him, afraid that I might have pushed him too far this time. But the scream soon turned into moaning, and then sobbing before he finally fell silent. I lifted my hips and he slid out of me.

“Turn around, I’ll let you out” I said.

He did, and I quickly unbuckled the straightjacket and helped him take it off. His movements were jerky and desperate when he tore it off and threw it on the floor. He lay down again and stared at the ceiling with wide, wild eyes, still breathing fast. I looked at him, full of mixed feelings. I loved him so much, but he was so far down a road I really shouldn’t be on. How far would he take us? Then I realized we couldn’t have done any of the things we’d done if I hadn’t helped, even instigated some of it. Who was really taking who?

“How are you feeling?” I asked and caressed his cheek. “Is the drug still working?”

He nodded. I lay down beside him and pulled the cover up over us. I held him, kissed his cheek, caressed his chest and his hair.

“It’s over” I said softly. “You’re safe.”

He nodded and I could feel him breathe slower. The wild look in his eyes started to fade and finally he turned his head and looked at me. I looked back and for several long seconds we were completely connected. Then he smiled.

“That was the most amazing experience I’ve ever had” he said. “I cannot express how much I love you, how grateful I am to you.”

I smiled.

“I quite liked it too” I said.

He laughed, and so did I.


	12. Chapter 12

My parents came to visit.

When I got married I had expected to see them often. I had pictured going to visit them every now and then, as well as receiving them in our house. Now it had been months and I hadn’t seen them once, so I was beside myself with joy when they finally arrived and I showed them into my home. We hugged and talked about the journey and how good it was to see each other, and Jonathan was friendly and polite and charmed them like he never had during our engagement.

But when we sat down to tea in the drawing room and the first flurry of greetings and formalities were over I felt strangely uncomfortable. Their faces and voices were so familiar but they also seemed like strangers to me. When I had left their home I had been a girl. It pained me now to see how naive I had been. I had seen Jonathan’s beauty and station and the necessity for marriage and nothing else. I had had no clue what awaited me. On the other hand, how could I? Nobody had ever told me what married life was like, and I knew now that Jonathan was not like other men.

I looked at him, sitting there in his nice jacket with his cup of tea, and a wave of affection washed through me. If I felt distant from my parents I felt much closer to him. I thought about what we had done with the straightjacket – it had become a favorite of ours since that first time – and found it difficult to look my parents in the eye. I wondered what they did in bed that nobody knew about. That made me feel even more detached from them. Did I even know them at all? I knew the side of them they presented to me, but nothing at all about their marriage or who they were in private.

“Where did you get that lovely dress?” my mother asked and forced me out of my thoughts.

“Oh, I had it made by the seamstress just down the street. The fabric is from the Penguin fashion store down on the square.”

My mother fingered the muslin in my dress. It was pale yellow and very good quality. Jonathan wasn’t exactly rich, but a lot of what he made he spent on me.

“You must take me there” mother said. “I’m desperate for some new clothes. You know how hard it is to get nice fabrics in the country. I have to make good use of this visit to the city!”

 

 

The next morning after breakfast we made plans to visit the shops.

“While you’re shopping” father said. “Perhaps Jonathan would be so kind as to show me around Arkham? I’m very curious to see it!”

Jonathan looked taken aback, and a short tense moment of silence followed.

“I’m afraid that’s not possible” Jonathan said at last. “We’re forced to keep security extremely strict, nobody is let in except Arkham employees.”

Father looked annoyed but tried to keep a friendly face.

“Surely you can make an exception for your father-in-law? I’m a doctor too, after all. Perhaps I could even be of use to you?”

Jonathan shook his head.

“I’m very sorry, but it’s not possible. We keep the country’s most dangerous criminals and have a responsibility to the State to keep them securely locked up. Security is everything to us.”

I looked at him and knew that wasn’t all of it. Certainly it was easier to keep the facility secure without guests running around the place, but the occasional visit couldn’t do any harm. Unless there were things you didn’t want them to see. To my surprise I felt myself sympathizing with Jonathan. I didn’t want my father to see Arkham either. He might not understand what we were doing there, and if there were suspicious deaths it would do no one any good to risk strangers stumbling over them.

“I’m sorry to hear that” father said and didn’t quite manage to hide his discontent.

“But I’d be happy to answer any questions you might have” Jonathan said. “I need to leave for work soon, but I’ll be at your disposal tonight. And I have an extensive library here in our home with many rare publications on the criminally insane, magazines as well as books. Also quite a few articles and volumes by my own humble pen in case you are interested.”

Father brightened quite a lot by that thought and agreed that he would come out on the town with us and then look at Jonathan’s library when we got back.

I showed them my favorite shops and ordered fabric for a few new dresses as well as some clothes for Jonathan. We went to the book store and the sweet shop as well before stopping at a tea room for lunch. We chatted amiably about what living in the city was like, who my friends were and society gossip. My parents told me what had happened in the country since I left.

“Talia is getting married” mother said. “But of course you knew that.”

I didn’t, actually. I remembered Talia writing about a suitor a while back, but I didn’t know they had settled on marriage. Our letters had become more and more scarce and I feared they would soon stop altogether. Her talk of country life, gossip about what neighbor did what and long discussions of fashion bored me, and what could I possibly write to her about? It made me feel sad but also helpless. We lived in different worlds now.

I nodded and wondered why she hadn’t invited me to the wedding. Or had she, and I had forgotten? I could go, but did I want to?

“We talked about it a while back, but it’s been a while since I had a letter from her” I said dismissively. “You know how it is, you’re so busy all the time. I’m a working woman after all…”

Mother gave me a strange look.

In the evening, after dinner, we all sat in the library. Father had spent all afternoon there and now he was discussing one of the books with Jonathan. Mother looked at me.

“You mentioned you work at Arkham?” she said.

I nodded.

“Three days a week. I work as a nurse, helping with small ailments. I have no part in the psychiatric treatments.”

“Is that wise?” mother asked. “Those people must be very dangerous.”

“It’s fine” I said and smiled. “We really do have very strict security. Jonathan would never let me come to any harm.”

I looked at Jonathan who was showing father a chart of something. Mother looked at me.

“I’m glad you seem so settled in your marriage” she said. “Are you happy?”

I thought about it. About all the terrifying moments, how frightening Jonathan could be, how life at Arkham had changed me. Then I thought of the feeling of partnership I had with Jonathan, how close we were through our nightly adventures and our working together. I looked at him again, his beautiful face and incredible eyes, his enthusiasm as he explained something to my father.

“Yes” I said. “I love him very much.”

“I’m so glad to hear that” she said but looked thoughtful. “I wanted a good marriage for you, a good station in life. If love comes into it, so much the better.”

That night I lay awake next to Jonathan and thought about the life I had left behind. I had spent all day with my parents but they were like distant friends rather than family now. It made me feel sad and lonely but also made me feel grown up. My husband was my priority now, just as it should be. I moved closer to him and nudged him to let me put my head on his shoulder. He moved slowly, his body warm and soft with sleep as he extended his arm and let me come close.

“Is everything alright?” he mumbled.

“Yes” I said and put my arm around him.

 

A few nights later I woke up with a start and Jonathan was screaming. I shook him, my heart pounding from the shock.

“Wake up!”

He opened his eyes and stared at me in horror.

“It’s just a nightmare” I said softly, caressing his hair and face.

He was sweating and breathing fast. I felt so helpless for not being able to do more for him. I didn’t think I would ever get used to seeing him like this.

“Are you all right?” I asked.

He nodded, sat up slowly and drank some water from the glass on his bedside table. I wondered if my parents had heard him scream. I listened for movement or voices from the guest room, but the house was quiet.

“Do you want to tell me?” I asked after he had started to calm down.

He sometimes did tell me about his dreams now, and I had to pretend I didn’t mind. The things he told me almost made me want to scream too, and I knew he didn’t tell me everything.

“The usual” he said and pulled his hand over his face. He sounded so tired, hoarse from the scream. “My mother locked me in the cellar and the monsters came in the dark.”

That was one of his most frequent nightmares. I wondered if the monsters in his dream were a symbol of something or a memory of something he had imagined as a child locked up in the dark, or a memory of someone actually coming to hurt him. From what he had told me I had managed to piece together that his mother wasn’t the only relative with a questionable mental status. I was relieved that we didn’t have any contact with my in-laws.

He lay down in my arms and eventually fell into a calm and peaceful sleep while my thoughts wandered and my heart ached.

 

The next morning my parents were giving me strange looks and I thought they must have heard Jonathan scream. Our servants were used to it and never seemed to notice, but for a guest it must be horrifying. After breakfast Jonathan left for work – I was relieved of my duties for as long as my parents stayed – and father went for a walk. Mother and I moved into the drawing room where we sat crocheting in uncomfortable silence. After a bit of small talk about the weather she finally said it:

“I thought I heard screaming last night.”

I nodded.

“That was Jonathan. He had a nightmare.”

Mother nodded and a thoughtful silence followed.

“It must have been a terrible dream” she said.

“Yes.”

More silence. I felt torn between wanting to confide in my mother and wanting to protect my husband’s privacy.

“That scream had my blood running cold” she said. “Does he have them often?”

“Now and then.”

She looked at me.

“It must be hard for you” she said.

“Not at all. I’m just happy I can help him.”

She nodded. Then she sighed and put her work down.

“When we accepted him as your fiancé, we knew… we had to find out as much as we could about him, to make sure he was suitable. He… he had a reputation of being… a little odd.”

I looked at her and I felt cold. What did she mean they knew? What did they know? She looked away and seemed uncomfortable.

“I don’t know how much he’s told you about his background?” she said.

“Very little” I said and thought about his nightmares.

“He’s had a difficult life, poor soul. His mother abandoned him when he was still a child and he was raised by relatives. As I’ve understood it they were quite… strict.”

Her tone said everything that her words left out and I thought about my husband screaming and crying in his sleep and finding release only when restrained in bed or while frightening his patients. An unfamiliar feeling started to rise in me: hatred. Hatred of his family, but also of mine, for knowingly giving an innocent girl to such a broken man without any warning or protection.

“We hesitated before agreeing” mother said. “He seemed intelligent and competent, but also cold. I had wanted a kinder man for you, but…”

She looked at me, her eyes full of distress.

“He was the best you could do?” I said, trying but not quite succeeding to keep the suffocating hatred out of my voice.

She looked sad.

“Yes” she said simply. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be” I said. “He’s my husband.”

She smiled, but looked insecure.

“You’ve found your place even better than I’d hoped” she said. “I’m very proud of you, mrs Crane.”

I forced myself to smile back.

 

I was relieved when they left. My mother’s confession only widened the gap between us. I knew they had done what they had to do when they married me to him, but I couldn’t help resenting it. They could have at least warned me. And what they knew about him was just the tip of the iceberg. I knew so much more now, and that made me feel even more distant from them. My life was here with him now. But it also made me sad, and in their wake they left a crushing loneliness.


	13. Chapter 13

”Someone’s been sneaking around here” Bane said when we had morning tea in Jonathan’s office at Arkham.

Jonathan gave him a sharp look.

“What do you mean sneaking around?”

“One of the orderlies saw someone sneaking around the grounds last night, and this morning there was a broken window in the east cellar.”

Jonathan stood up.

“Did they get in?” he asked.

“No, the window was locked. Looked like someone had tried to open it but without success.”

“We need better security” Jonathan said and started pacing around the room. “Double the guards, and get more dogs.”

“It was probably just some nut. People are curious.”

“If they got as far as the window they got too far” Jonathan said and sounded unreasonably upset. “What do we have guards for? What if they had managed to let a prisoner out?”

Bane looked at him in silence for a moment and looked like he wanted to say something dismissive. Then he shrugged.

“I’ll double the guards” he said.

 

“What’s Doc so upset about?” the Joker asked later as I gave him his medicine through the hatch in the door. “Did you say no to his little games?”

I ignored him and stirred his powder in a glass of water.

“Must be something exciting” the Joker said. “He couldn’t finish my therapy. Started hyperventilating and had to excuse himself. I was so disappointed.”

I tried to hide how worried his words made me.

“Those therapy sessions are all the fun I have around here” the Joker complained. “I wonder if he got a bit of his own drugs in his morning tea. Maybe he doesn’t enjoy it as much when he gets a taste of it himself. More fun to see the effects in others.”

I couldn’t help thinking about the diluted version of the drug we sometimes used in bed. As usual the Joker seemed to read my mind.

“Oh!” he yelled and laughed. “So he does enjoy it! Or does he make you take it? No, he wouldn’t do that. You would never let him, would you dear?”

I started to close the hatch.

“I wish I was free of these tiresome restraints so I could fuck him myself” the Joker said longingly. “I could put all those lovely quirks of his to good use even better than his little wife. And he is a beauty, isn’t he? Those eyes are just to die for.”

He laughed and pressed his face to the half-closed hatch.

“I’ve seen his thing” he said happily. “I envy you.”

I slammed the hatch shut and walked away, my cheeks burning with a mix of excitement and anger.

 

I went to see Jonathan in his office. He was sitting by his desk and I could see that he was still upset.

“Are you all right?” I asked.

“What?” he said and looked up at me. “Yes, of course. Why wouldn’t I be?”

“The Joker said you interrupted his therapy.”

He looked at me with contempt that made my stomach ache.

“You should know better than to listen to madmen” he said.

“Of course” I said. “I’m sorry.”

He turned his attention back to his work, and after a moment of standing there feeling stupid, so did I.

 

The same evening we were interrupted by a message while we sat in the library after dinner.

“There’s a gentleman at the door” the butler said. “He wishes to speak to Dr Crane.”

Jonathan looked at him and seemed concerned.

“Who is it?” he asked.

Roberts handed over a card. _John Blake, writer and reporter, Gotham Times_ , it said.

“What does he want?”

“I’m afraid he didn’t say. He only said that he hopes the doctor will forgive the intrusion and be so kind as to give him a moment of his time.”

Jonathan looked at me. He looked scared, and his fear spread to me. I didn’t want any strangers in my house.

“A reporter” Jonathan said and looked at the card again. “He probably wants to talk about one of my court cases. If I turn him away he might take it the wrong way. Send him in but let him know we will have to be very brief.”

“Of course, sir.”

The butler disappeared and returned a minute later with a young man in tow. He looked good in an ordinary kind of way. Jonathan got up to greet him.

“Dr Crane” the man said with a smile. “Please forgive my rude intrusion. I’m John Blake, I’m very pleased to meet you. I tried to reach you at Arkham, but the guard wouldn’t let me in.”

“We have very strict security” Jonathan said stiffly and shook Blake’s hand.

“Mrs Crane” Blake said and bowed to me.

Jonathan gestured at him to sit and they both sat down.

“Of course” Blake said. “If I could only ask you some questions? It won’t take long.”

“Questions about what?”

Mr Blake glanced at me.

“I would hate to bore the lady” he said. “If she would like to excuse herself I’d understand even though I’d be sad to see the room robbed of her beauty.”

Jonathan glanced at me too, and I thought about how he had snapped at me earlier today. There was no sign of that now though.

“My wife is also my partner and colleague and will stay or go as she pleases” he said and I loved the pride in his voice.

“Of course” Blake said.

I noticed that Jonathan hadn’t offered tea, and didn’t send the butler away. There was a tension in the room I was not used to.

“It’s unusual for a woman to set foot in a place like Arkham” Blake said and looked at me.

“We have female inmates” I said.

Jonathan smiled as if I’d said something funny. Blake smiled too.

“That’s true” he said. “How do you like the place? Is it what you had expected?”

“Excuse me” Jonathan said. “You had questions for me?”

“Of course. I’m sorry. I’m writing an article on Arkham, and of course I want to go straight to the source. There have been rumors of experimental treatments, an extensive use of psychofarmaceuticals and an unusually high morbidity. What do you say to that?”

Jonathan gave him his most contemptuous smile. He had a way of looking at you as if you made him nauseous. He rarely used it on me, and for that I was deeply grateful.

“Rumors are created by the ignorant” he said.

“So what is the truth?”

“The truth” Jonathan said patiently. “Is that we run the country’s – and possibly the world’s – most modern and advanced asylum for criminals. We keep the most dangerous criminals off the streets, develop the cutting edge of psychofarmaceuticals and conduct research that is vital for the future treatment of the insane everywhere.”

I could feel the pride in his words, not just radiating from him but also in my own heart.

“What does that research consist of?” Blake asked.

“I have written several articles on my experimental treatments. They are not secret.”

“And the death rate?”

“The death rate is normal for a prison or asylum. You must remember that these people are very deeply disturbed. Their lives are nothing like ours.”

“You don’t consider it unethical to use hallucinogenic drugs on helpless patients?”

That stopped Jonathan in his tracks. I wondered if that was perhaps not included in his articles.

“Absolutely not” he said in a cold tone. “When you have the training and experience of psychiatry that I have, I would be happy to discuss treatments with you. Until then I am afraid you simply cannot understand.”

“There is rumored that some of your treatments resemble torture…”

Jonathan stood up. His face was pale and his eyes hard and hostile.

“I must ask you to leave. I will not have these ridiculous accusations in my home.”

“If I could just ask a few more questions…”

“Leave now!”

Jonathan’s voice was shrill and I realized he was terrified. I wondered what I would do if Blake became violent. With the butler we were three against one, but we had no idea what Blake was capable of. How stupid we had been to let him in!

“Very well” Blake said, got up and held his hands placatingly out to Jonathan. “But if I don’t get the answers I seek from you I’ll just find them somewhere else.”

The butler put his hands on Blake’s shoulders and turned him towards the door.

“I would do as the doctor asks” he said.

“Take your hands off me!” Blake said and freed himself.

He left and the butler followed him to the door. Jonathan started pacing the room. He was shaking and breathing hard.

“Jonathan…” I said softly and tried to put my hand on his arm.

He shook it off.

“How dare he come here with his stupid questions and ridiculous accusations!” he said.

“Ignore him” I said. “He knows nothing…”

He didn’t seem to hear me. He kept pacing around the room talking to himself.

“Nobody understands what I’m trying to do! Wherever I go I hear implications and rumors that I’m declaring everyone insane so I can play with them at Arkham. Perhaps I should just let all my inmates out and then see what people think!”

He was getting himself more and more worked up, soon breathing too hard to be able to speak. His hands opened and closed and his eyes were wide with fear and anger.

“Jonathan!” I said and grabbed both his arms, hard. “Snap out of it!”

He tried to get loose, and I slapped his cheek. He stopped moving, became very still and looked right at me. We stood there for a moment, staring at each other in silence. I held my breath wondering what would come. Would he be angry? But he surprised me by suddenly bursting into tears. He put his hands over his face and cried helplessly. I awkwardly put my arms around him and tried to comfort him.

“It’s okay” I said. “It’s fine now.”

“No it’s not” he sobbed into my shoulder. “Men like him will be my ruin. All my work will come to nothing because of their lies and ignorance.”

I didn’t know what to say, so I just held him and stroked his back and hair. Finally he managed to compose himself, wiped the tears from his cheeks and took a deep breath. He looked at me.

“I have come to rely so heavily on you” he said. “I barely remember what it was like to be alone.”

I smiled a little. He smiled too and caressed my cheek.

“To think that I have someone who can see me like this and not lose her composure or make me feel ashamed of my outbursts of emotion. I never thought I would be so lucky.”

His voice wavered as if he was on the verge of tears again. His eyes were shiny and seemed larger and more beautiful than ever.

“I love you” I said softly. “Why don’t we have a cup of tea and go to bed?”

“Yes” he said and smiled. “What a good idea.”

I expected him to have nightmares that night, and I was right. He woke me up several times with his tossing, turning and mumbling in his sleep. I woke him up the first few times and then I had a nightmare of my own. I dreamed that Arkham was overrun with people trying to discover all our secrets. They took Jonathan away and left me alone and screaming for him. I woke up and found Jonathan writhing in yet another nightmare. But though I felt relieved to see him and to realize the dream was just a dream, I also felt deeply tired. Tired from lack of sleep, tired of him, tired of everything. I turned my back at him, let him stay in his own private hell and went back to sleep.


	14. Chapter 14

I kept an extra eye on the paper after Mr Blake’s visit. We had the Gotham Times and I read it occasionally. Two days after Mr Blake had been to see us I glanced at the headline of the paper the butler handed me and I froze.

WHAT REALLY GOES ON AT ARKHAM?was printed in block letter across the page. Under the headline was a picture of Arkham asylum in all its gothic glory. I looked at the butler, and our eyes met for half a second before he turned away.

“Will that be all, ma’am?” he asked.

“Yes” I said, my voice weak as a whisper. “You may go.”

He left and I opened the paper, slowly as if it might bite. The article was a whole spread, with pictures of Arkham, Jonathan, Bane and myself as well as a few of our more prominent inmates. I recognized one of them as a famous serial killer who had been in Arkham for years before he died a few months ago. I skimmed through the text with my heart in my throat. It was a horrifying read. Blake had written down all the rumors and accusations he had mentioned to us, and then some. They were written in a mysterious tone that implied that whether these rumors were true or not there was no doubt that unspeakable things were going on at Arkham.

There were nuggets of truth too, that he couldn’t have known about unless someone who had been at Arkham had told him. I wondered if someone in our staff had betrayed us. There were stories about intense therapy sessions with drugs that enhanced emotions, accounts of mysterious deaths, and hints about high-profile criminals sent to Arkham under questionable circumstances. Under the picture of me was a caption about how Mrs Crane was aiding her husband in his “inhumane experiments”. It made the picture of me look like a cold and hard woman who might do anything.

I closed the paper and sat in cold anxiety wondering how Jonathan would react when he saw this. If I was lucky he would see it at Arkham and the worst would be over before he got home. I was grateful it was my day off.

 

He came home just before lunch and the look on his face confirmed my fears. He looked even worse than he had when he had thrown Mr Blake out. Pale and exhausted.

“Come in, dear” I said, took him to the library and gestured at the butler to bring tea. “I saw the paper. How are you?”

“I’m going to sue the bastard” he said. ”I’ll sue him for slander.”

”Nobody will listen to his lies” I said although I wasn’t as certain as I was trying to sound. “It’s ridiculous.”

”Of course they will listen, it’s in the Times!” he said, an edge of hysteria in his voice. “The City will listen, and they might cut financing to Arkham, or launch an investigation!”

“You don’t know that. Wait and see what happens.”

The butler came in with the tea.

“Call my lawyer!” Jonathan told him. ”I need to see him right away!”

“How about tomorrow?” I suggested. ”You need some rest so you can think clearly.”

I poured tea but he ignored it. He seemed to forget about the butler and wanting to see his lawyer and just sat for a while with his head in his hands. I waved the butler away. Then Jonathan got up and started to pace around the room.

“Won’t you have some tea?” I pleaded.

He didn’t answer and his silence scared me more than his outbursts. He turned towards the window, his back at me.

“I’ll have him taken care of” he mumbled. “He’ll regret he ever tried to mess with me.”

I went up to him and put my arms around him.

“Come and lie down for a moment” I said. “Everything will feel easier after you’ve had some rest and time to think.”

He turned around and looked at me. Then he nodded and the anxiety in his eyes gave way to exhaustion. I went into the bedroom with him and helped him take his jacket, shoes and cravat off and loosen his shirt so he could lie down comfortably on the bed. I sat on the side of the bed and caressed his hair.

“Everything is going to be all right” I said softly. “You’ll see.”

He smiled a little.

“I’m so glad I have you” he said.

“You’ll always have me, no matter what happens. Now try to rest.”

He closed his eyes and I kept gently caressing him while he slowly relaxed. Finally he fell asleep. I sat there a moment longer looking at him. He looked so innocent, so different from the rage and anxiety from before. I wondered what on Earth I would do with him, and then I went to the dining room and asked the cook to save some food for when he woke up.

 

The next few days were tense to say the least. Jonathan continued to behave as if everyone was out to get him, which wasn’t far from the truth. We couldn’t leave the house without being swarmed by reporters, curious onlookers, human rights activists and plain lunatics, everyone with an opinion about us and Arkham. We began to spend more and more time at Arkham to the point where we even slept there. At least there we were safe.

We tried to focus on our work, but it was difficult when emotions ran high. Jonathan was nervous and irritable, and Bane responded by growing silent and sullen. Bane was never a chatty person, but he could talk at length when he was in the mood. Now he just went about his work looking grim and annoyed, barely speaking except for when he was arguing with Jonathan. I never knew what they argued about – they made sure I was out of the room – but I could hear their raised voices more than once.

When I went on my medicine round I found that the Joker had been taken off my list. I went to see Jonathan in his office. He looked thin and haggard, like a scarecrow, and I pitied him while at the same time he annoyed me too. He was a grown man in a controversial field of work. He should be used to people disagreeing with him and things not going his way. I found his fearful behavior childish and hard to sympathize with.

“Why is the Joker not on the medicine list?” I asked.

He gave me a cold, angry look.

“I told you not to talk to him, but you didn’t listen. I don’t want you to work with him anymore.”

“I haven’t talked to him!”

“Really?” Jonathan looked disgusted. “Then how does he know about things that only you and I should know?”

I could see that under the anger he was embarrassed and I thought I knew what had happened.

“He reads us” I said. “He’s very good at guessing. I never told him anything!”

He snorted.

“He can’t guess everything” he said. “He has to have something to work with.”

“He’s told me plenty about you” I said. “Things he _really_ shouldn’t know.”

Jonathan’s face lost all color and he stood up.

“I told you not to listen to him!” he yelled. “If you’re not competent enough to handle the inmates in a professional way I will replace you with someone who is!”

I stared at him. I couldn’t believe he just said that after everything I had put up with from him.

“Professional?” I said. “Really? Says the man who likes to touch himself during therapy?”

I had hoped that story wasn’t true, but I could see on Jonathan’s face that it was. My heart sank.

“Despite everything, I am the only one who is completely on your side” I spat at him. “You should be very careful or you will end up all alone.”

I left. As I walked down the corridor I felt ashamed of my outburst but I also felt good. Never before had I been so full of rage and been able to let it out in such a satisfying way.

I finished my medicine round with some difficulty. The inmates had been rowdy and restless the last few days. They picked up on our moods just like animals. Several of them refused to take their medicines and I had to ask Bane for help in forcing them.

“Bloody idiots” he muttered when we finished the last one. “This is all Crane’s fault. He turns this place upside down. Can’t you get him to calm down?”

We walked down the corridor towards my room where I kept my equipment.

“I try” I said. “It’s not that easy. He seems convinced that reporter is going to ruin his life.”

“Tell him it’s taken care of.”

“What is?”

“Just tell him. And if he won’t calm down, slip him a fucking sedative.”

I looked at him in shock. He laughed.

“I do it myself now and then” he said. “Half a spoon of it in his tea and he calms right the fuck down. Oh don’t look so shocked. I could never work with the little bastard if I didn’t have my tricks. Surely you do too?”

We arrived at my room and stopped outside the door.

“Well, yes” I said. “But…”

“And I hope you’ll help yourself if you need to relax. A shame to have the world’s best drug supply and waste it on these animals.”

He made a gesture towards the cell block.

“You… you use the drugs?” I said.

He laughed.

“I’ll tell you” he said.  “Take half a spoon of that hallucinogenic stuff, I forget its name, in half a glass of laudanum. You’ll be in heaven for the next five hours. Gives you terrible indigestion, but it’s worth it. Holy mother of God!”

I blushed and swallowed, too flustered to know what to do with myself.

“I need to talk to my husband” I stammered mostly to get away from him and his filthy language. “If you’ll excuse me.”

He made an exaggerated bow and left. I watched him for a few seconds and then went to Jonathan’s office on shaky legs. I thought about the drug he sometimes used when we were in bed together, with or without the straightjacket. It had never occurred to me that I could take something too. That drugs could have other uses than strictly therapeutic.

I knocked on the door to Jonathan’s office, and he yanked it open and threw his arms around me.

“I’m so sorry!” he said, his voice shrill with emotion. “Please don’t leave me! I will never question your competence again. You’re right, the Joker is a master at reading us and I knew that. I don’t know why I said those things.”

I gently nudged him inside and closed the door.

“There now, take it easy. I’m not going to leave you. Everything is fine.”

I caressed his back and hair, gently rubbed his neck to try and calm him down.

“I could never leave you” I said softly. “You’re my husband.”

He let go of me and put his hands over his face. I wondered if he was crying, but when he took his hands down his eyes were dry but full of distress. He looked a mess.

“Why don’t you sit down and I’ll get you a nice cup of tea?” I said. “Bane says it’s taken care of, whatever that means. Is that good?”

He looked relieved and even smiled a little. He sank down onto the nearest chair.

“Yes” he said. “That’s good.”

“Good. I’ll be right back.”

I pulled my fingers gently through his hair and kissed his cheek and then I left. I went by the medicine storage on my way to the kitchen to fetch a sedative.


	15. Chapter 15

The next morning during our morning tea in Jonathan’s office I was made aware of two significant events that had taken place during the night. The Joker had died, of a heart attack the chart said, and we had a new inmate. Mr John Blake had been admitted for stabbing a hooker during a sudden onset of acute psychosis late last night and now occupied one of our cells. I didn’t know what to say. I felt cold and sick. I looked at Bane and Jonathan but neither of them seemed to think anything unusual had happened.

“How did this happen?” I asked Jonathan after the meeting when we were alone in his office.

He was sitting at his desk and I was in the visitor’s chair.

“What are you referring to?”

“What happened to the Joker? Did you… did you kill him?”

The last two words came out as a whisper. I felt nauseous. Jonathan looked at me with steel in his eyes and didn’t say anything. He didn’t need to.

“My God” I said and leaned my head in my hands. “I can’t believe this is happening.”

I wanted to cry but I didn’t know if I could. I didn’t even feel sad, or particularly shocked. Just empty.

“He was dangerous, he knew too much” Jonathan said. “And we were getting nowhere with his treatment.”

“But… you can’t just kill him! He was a human being, not a rabid dog!”

“Not much difference” Jonathan said.

“Yes! There’s a world of difference!”

I looked at him and felt like vomiting when it finally dawned on me what all the strange deaths were about. He’d done this before. Many times. Were all those “heart attacks” and fake cholera epidemics inmates that had become troublesome? Frightened him, threatened him, found out too much?

Jonathan got up from his desk, walked around it to me and crouched in front of me. He took both my hands in his.

“He was a very bad man that nobody is going to miss” he said softly. “He had killed people, and would kill many more if we hadn’t got him locked up here. He would never be able to return to society, the world is better off without him.”

 _And you?_ I thought. What are you? How many have _you_ killed? But if Jonathan died at least _I_ would miss him. At that moment I felt something give way inside me. It was just a small thing, but it changed me. Some part of my morality, of my soul, died when I realized that I could accept what Jonathan had done. I didn’t like it, but I could give in to it. I loved and needed him more than I objected to killing patients.

“And Blake?” I asked and looked at him.

“Blake can’t hurt us anymore. He brought this on himself.”

I nodded. It came as no surprise to me that Jonathan was responsible for that too. He might not have been there to make Blake lose his mind, but there was no doubt he was behind it. My Jonathan, so good at mixing just the right combination of drugs.

“I want to see him.”

“Very well” he said and stood up.

He took me to one of the previously empty cells and opened the hatch. Mr Blake was sitting on the bed. His face was blank, his eyes dead, and a trickle of drool ran down his chin. It pained me to see him like that, but it was also a kind of relief.

“What will happen to him?” I asked. “Tell me the truth.”

Jonathan looked at me.

“He’s on a mixture of drugs that over time will destroy his mind and put him in a permanent catatonic state.”

He sounded calm and serious, almost sad. I felt tired to the bone.

“And the acute psychosis? Did he actually stab that woman?”

“He did, and it can be brought on again if necessary. For a time.”

I nodded and watched Blake drool quietly in his cell. I wondered if anything still went on in his head. Did he have any kind of thoughts or feelings or was he completely shut down? 

“I have to know one more thing” I said. “If I ever cause you trouble, could you do this to me?”

Jonathan’s eyes widened and I heard him inhale sharply.

“Of course not” he said. “Not you. Never.”

I met his eyes and found that I believed him. Then I kissed him. My mind and body found a way to escape the horror and sadness of Blake in his cell and I felt desire flare up inside me. We hadn’t been doing much in bed lately with all that had happened. Something inside me yearned for it. I pressed my body against him, kissed him again and felt his hardness through our clothes. John Blake looked on in blank apathy. We closed his hatch and hurried to one of the vacant treatment rooms.

 

The Joker passed from the world without any notice, but we knew that Blake’s timely illness would raise suspicion. The Gotham Times published a short article about how ironic and tragic it was that the journalist who wrote so critically about Arkham would end up there himself. There was an undertone of skepticism, but nothing outspoken. Jonathan participated at a press conference and said that Blake’s interest in Arkham must have been a cry for help. I was there watching him and I was so proud. He was calm and professional, discussing the nature of Blake’s illness and treatment in a detached, medical way. There were plenty of questions about Blake’s condition and prognosis, but no further accusations or questions about what he had written about.

I continued to slip small doses of sedative into Jonathan’s tea on and off while we waited for the public interest in Arkham to die down. It made my life a lot easier. I had already learned to predict his moods so it was easy to prevent outbursts of fear and anger with half a spoon of powder from a bottle I kept hidden in my bedside table. It even eased his nightmares.

“I know you’re giving me something” he said on one such occasion.

We had moved back to our house again but it had been a difficult day with one of the conspiracy nuts trying to break in to find out “the truth about John Blake and Arkham”.  I looked at Jonathan who was sitting in the sofa in the library, chemically relaxed.

“I don’t mind” he added. “Just don’t do it too often. Some sedatives are addictive, or they can have harmful side effects. That’s why I never use them myself, though I certainly have use for them.”

He laughed. I nodded.

“I’ll be careful” I promised.

He nodded too.

“Are you taking anything?” he asked.

“Sometimes.”

 

When the police came we were ready. We were sent a message from the guard on the bridge before they even approached the island. It took them a little while to get through all the guards and locked gates and arrive at the front door. There were three of them – a plainclothes detective and two uniformed officers.

“I’m detective James Gordon” the detective said. “I have a warrant to search the premises.”

“May I ask what you’re searching for?” Jonathan asked politely.

“We need to see inmate John Blake. We’ll need his charts as well as any other documentation you might have that concerns his case.”

“Of course. If you’d just show me the warrant.”

Gordon handed him the document and he looked it over. I felt a wave of bitterness that Rachel hadn’t warned me of her husband’s intentions. We hadn’t seen much of each other lately but we were still friends and I would have expected it.

Jonathan showed Gordon in, polite and smiling, but as soon as Gordon turned his back to him Jonathan glared at him with open hatred. I hoped the detective would play his cards right, or he too might find himself drooling in a cell. The thought gave me a feeling of power not unlike the one I had when I was tying up Jonathan in bed.

We took them to Blake’s cell. Blake had been given an injection as soon as we knew the police were coming, and was hallucinating wildly. He staggered around his cell screaming at things that didn’t exist. I could see the combination of pity and disgust in the detective’s face while Jonathan showed him Blake’s charts and explained his diagnosis and treatment in layman’s terms.

“Can’t you give him something to calm him down?” Gordon said after a while with a pained expression on his face.

“We do, regularly. But you can’t keep a man sedated all the time. It will damage his brain and make him unreceptive to treatment.”

Gordon nodded and watched Blake try to hide under his bed. He turned away.

“I’ve seen enough” he said. “Thank you for your cooperation, Dr Crane.”

“My pleasure.”


	16. Chapter 16

”Did the police come to Arkham?” Rachel asked when we were having tea together a few weeks later.

Things had calmed down considerably. The press finally seemed to have lost interest in Arkham, though the papers still carried the occasional editorial about how Arkham needed to be fully investigated. They criticized how a tax funded facility could be allowed such secrecy, while others defended us and said that the nature of a place like Arkham and its inmates required secrecy for all our safety. We had letters from other medical professionals, and others too for that matter, who expressed their support for us, as well as hateful letters condemning us to hell and accusing us of one conspiracy crazier than the other. Then nothing happened for a while.

“Yes” I said. “They wanted to see Mr Blake.”

I had more or less forgiven her for not warning me that the police were coming.

She nodded and didn’t say anything more for a while. I started to talk about the new dress Mrs Wayne had worn to the opera and how it was already influencing fashion in the city, but Rachel seemed absent-minded.

“I think Harvey is about to start an investigation of Arkham” she said finally.

“What?” I said and forgot all about printed fabric and hat colors. “Why?”

She seemed uncomfortable.

“Isn’t it a strange coincidence that Mr Blake took ill after that article?”

I smiled.

“You never met him” I said. “He was clearly unwell even before that.”

“Harvey doesn’t believe that. He thinks you… someone at Arkham might have done something to Blake to silence him.”

“Why on Earth would anyone want to do that? It would just make it look like we had something to hide.”

“I don’t know. I’m not that involved in Harvey’s work, and my friendship with you puts me in a difficult position. But Harvey thinks what happened to Blake has silenced the entire press corps. No one will write about Arkham now for fear of meeting the same fate.”

“I thought Mr Dent and Jonathan were friends.”

“Well…” she said, hesitating. “I don’t know. Anyway, I thought I should warn you. Not that I think you are hiding anything, but… well, you mentioned how Dr Crane hasn’t been well, and an investigation might be difficult for him.”

I looked at her, surprised by how distressed she seemed. She was not like herself at all. She was usually so cheerful and charming, confident sometimes bordering on arrogant, but now she seemed tormented..

“Thank you” I said and felt touched. “I will mention it to him.”

She nodded. We talked about books for a while but then she claimed to have a headache and wondered if I might excuse her.

When I came home I thought about how to break the news to Jonathan. He was doing better but was still tense and nervous about all the attention we had been getting. It might take more than some sedative in his tea to get him through a formal investigation.

At bedtime I still hadn’t managed to tell him. I decided that if I made him relaxed and happy first it might be easier. I went up to him as he was about to change into his pajamas.

“Perhaps you would like your special shirt instead?” I said and kissed his cheek.

We called it that. His special shirt. I had tried it on once too, but I didn’t like being restricted so we had continued to use it on him.

He smiled.

“I would like that” he said.

“Do you have any left of the drug?”

“Yes.”

“Enough for me too?”

His eyes widened.

“Would you like some?” he asked.

I nodded. I had taken sedatives occasionally but had never felt inclined to try the drug he liked to use in bed.

“It enhances all emotions, does it not?” I asked. “Not only fear?”

“That’s right. And it intensifies the physical pleasure. Your orgasm will be stronger.”

I blushed. He sometimes used words like that for what we did. It came naturally to him because of his work, but I could never get used to such blunt expressions.

“I will give you a small dose” he said. “You can see how you like it and have more if you want.”

I nodded. He prepared the drug for us, measuring it out in the water glasses on our bedside tables with quick and nimble fingers. He handed me mine and raised his.

“Cheers” he said.

It had a vaguely salty taste but I didn’t feel anything at first. I helped him take his clothes off and undressed myself before I put his special shirt on. I fastened the straps tight, surprised by the pleasure I took in strapping him in. There was something so pleasant about the coarse, strong fabric in the shirt and the metal buckles on the straps. I felt a surge of power and strength and my body started to tingle with feverish anticipation.

He lay down on the bed and I sat across his thighs. The frightened, helpless look in his eyes heightened my pleasure as I touched him and myself simultaneously. Now and then I could see him pulling at the shirt, unable to control the need to get out, torn between the pleasure he was feeling and the panic of being restrained. I heard myself moan and wondered if I might reach my peak without even having him inside me. I forced myself to stop, confused by the intensity of my feelings and then realized it must be the drug. Again I wondered what he must be feeling, his mind already pulsing with fear at being stuck in the straightjacket and then the drug to blow it out of proportion while he also had the sexual pleasure. I couldn’t imagine it.

I raised my hips over him and then pushed down hard so he slipped inside me. I rode him hard and fast, completely absorbed by what I was feeling. The pleasure seemed to spread in all directions, beyond my control.

“I can’t hold it any longer” Jonathan gasped.

“You will!”

“I can’t!”

I slapped him in the face.

“Do as you’re told!” I yelled.

After only a few more seconds I tumbled over the peak and screamed as it exploded inside me. I heard his scream mingle with mine and we became one – one pulsating body overcome by these unbelievable feelings.

As soon as I was able I unfastened the straps on the straightjacket and then collapsed on the bed, pleasure still echoing through me. I heard Jonathan struggle to get out of the garment and throw it on the floor. Then he lay down next to me with a sigh. We lay still for a while, just breathing.

“How did you like it?” he asked finally.

“Couldn’t you tell?” I said.

He laughed.

“I wonder what the neighbors think of us.”

I laughed too.

“Did you develop this drug?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“How did you know what it could do? And how can you fine-tune it so?”

He looked at me and smiled.

“I did exactly what John Blake accused me of. I experimented on my patients.”

I looked at him.

“How did it go?”

“Some died” he said. “Some went into deep psychosis or slipped into a coma. But some… responded beautifully. Without those sacrifices we would never have the medicines we have today. We would still be locking up the mentally ill and throwing away the key. Or having them executed.”

It made me think of Rachel’s warning. I would never get a better opportunity than this to tell him. He listened quietly when I told him about the impending investigation, and then lay in silent thought for a while.

“Can we risk an investigation?” I asked when he didn’t say anything.

“No, of course not. And I will not allow the DA’s assistants to put their filthy hands on our records. Arkham is mine.”

“How do we… Do we make him insane? Like Blake?”

“No. No, that would be too obvious. We will have to be smarter than that. Give me some time to think.”

I nodded. I pulled my fingers gently through his hair and felt strangely content.

 

“This” Jonathan said and held up a bottle with a clear liquid. “This creates a feeling of happiness, strength, even euphoria. For a while. When it wears off you feel the opposite. Utterly worthless. It’s also unbelievably addictive.”

We were in the medicine storage at Arkham – me, Jonathan and Bane.

“What use would such a drug have?” I asked.

Jonathan glanced at Bane with an amused smile. Bane shrugged.

“When it’s good it’s really good” he said. “There are other drugs you can use that will counteract the negative effects, if you know your stuff.”

“There are” Jonathan agreed. “There are also drugs that can counteract the positive effects, and enhance the negative. Like this one.”

He showed us another bottle with a blue powder.

“If perfectly balanced, these two will create a persistent feeling of depression and hopelessness. If you add a mild sedative as well, the patient will be less likely to wonder at the change in his mood and it will make him tired.”

“How does this help us?” I asked. “I thought we wanted Dent to…”

I made a gesture at my head to signal losing one’s mind. Bane laughed.

“We call this the Suicide Cocktail” he said.

I looked at the bottles.

“You’re going to make Dent kill himself?” I said.

Jonathan grinned. Despite myself I felt impressed.

“All we need to do is get this into Mr Dent at regular intervals and place some ideas in his head. Why don’t you invite him over for dinner?”

 

“I must confess” Jonathan said at dinner. “That there’s a reason I’ve invited you, apart from the pleasure of your company.”

Mr and Mrs Dent looked at him. Rachel looked nervous, her husband calmly curious. It had been a nice dinner so far but all I could think about was the glass in Mr Dent’s hand. He had emptied it – including Jonathan’s drug – a while ago.

“I’ve heard there might be an investigation of Arkham” Jonathan said. “Is it true?”

“Where did you hear it?” Mr Dent said.

“That’s irrelevant. One hears so much…”

“Well… Yes. I believe the events lately warrants an investigation.”

“I must admit I’m hurt” Jonathan said. “We’re fiends. If you have questions about Arkham, why not come straight to me?”

Mr Dent looked uncomfortable and I wondered if the drug was working, worming its way into his subconscious and making him doubt himself.

“I mean no offense” he said. “But with all due respect, Arkham is more than you. It’s a tax funded facility with a very important part to play in how the city works. We need more transparency.”

“Have I ever tried to hide anything?” Jonathan said in a sad, tired voice. “I truly hope I can change your mind. A small, informal inquiry would be just as useful to you but much less disruptive for me.”

“I understand, but it’s important to make this official. I assure you we will make every effort not to disturb your work.”

“I’m sure you will, but having strangers all over Arkham _will_ disturb my work, and the welfare of my patients. Also… as embarrassing as it is to admit, these last months have taken their toll on me.”

He laughed bitterly.

“You would expect a psychiatrist to have a strong psyche, but I’m afraid I can’t quite live up to that. Having my work questioned and doubted, slandered in the press, all the chaos of being publicly accused. It has left me quite worse for wear. Another upheaval like this will finish me.”

I could actually see the guilt and insecurity in Dent’s face. It made the hair on my arms stand up. I knew Jonathan was skilled at manipulating people, but I hadn’t realized he was this good.

“I’ll see what I can do” Dent said.

“If you can’t stop a formal investigation, at least do me the service of handling it personally. If I have to turn my asylum inside out, at least let it be to you.”

Dent looked relieved.

“Now that I can promise you” he said.

When they left, they left a gloomy, uncomfortable feeling behind. I looked at Jonathan.

“Well done” I said softly.

He looked at me. He looked tired, worn.

“I’m going to bed” he said.

That night he dreamed that Arkham was taken away from him and he was put in one of the cells. He cried himself back to sleep in my arms.

 

It took about three weeks. I didn’t see much of Dent but I knew he saw Jonathan on a daily basis. Dent had pursued the investigation, but it was progressing slowly. Rachel came to me with her worries.

“He’s not himself” she said. “He’s… sad. Tired. I don’t know what’s happened to him. I’ve told him to see a doctor, but he refuses.”

“I’m sure it will pass” I said. “Maybe he’s overworked?”

“Maybe. I don’t know what to do.”

One morning the Gotham Times headline read “DA Harvey Dent dead! Hung himself in his home!” A few days later we had more good news: the Times reported that Dent’s investigation into Arkham had been stopped. His replacement DA considered it a waste of time and wouldn’t grant continued resources for it.

Jonathan and I looked at each other over the breakfast table. He smiled. I smiled back.

 

EPILOGUE

It was snowing when we went to Harvey Dent’s funeral. It was still early winter and most of the snow melted when it reached the ground, but it lingered for a while on our black hats and clothes, little specks of bright white on black.

“I’m so sorry” I said and hugged Rachel when we came out of the church.

She looked like she had done nothing but cry for several days. Her face was red and swollen and she looked tired and lost. I did feel sorry for her, but I felt no guilt about Dent’s passing. We had only been defending ourselves and he was an unfortunate casualty.

“I don’t know how this could have happened” she said and tried to dry her tears with a handkerchief that was already wet. I handed her a clean one. “He might not have been the happiest person, but he would never leave me like this!”

“I know” I said and touched her arm in sympathy. “It’s hard to know what goes on in a person’s heart and mind. I’m sure he didn’t want to leave you.”

She nodded. We stood there waiting for the coffin to be carried out to the grave. The other funeral guests were slowly gathering outside the church. Jonathan had been talking to someone, but now he came up to me and hooked his arm around mine.

“I’m very sorry for your loss” he said to Rachel. “Mr Dent was a friend and he will be sorely missed.”

“Thank you” Rachel said.

“If there’s anything we can do, just let us know.”

“I will.”

Her mother came out.

“If you’ll excuse me” Rachel said.

“Of course.”

Rachel and her mother walked over to the grave. I followed with Jonathan. I looked at him. He looked relaxed, his eyes clear and calm. The falling snow was beautiful where it landed on his black hair.


End file.
